record. >> john cox, thank you very much. good morning, everyone. i'm dara brown. i'm in for alex witt. we begin with breaking news. a russian airliner with more than 220 people on board has crashed in egypt, sinai peninsula. reuters citing egypt's civil aviation reports that it took off at sharm el sheikh headed for st. petersburg, russia, just before 6:00 a.m. local time. it disappeared from radar 23 minutes after takeoff. search and rescue teams are at the site in sinai. let's bring in john cox, former pilot and aviation expert. you mentioned this is very reliable aircraft. but let's switch to the area. do you know much about the area in which this plane was flying? >> i have not flown there. i have flown over it. it's desolate.

it's mountainous. it's arid, it has been described earlier. it's not an area with a high population. so it's challenging for the rescuers and the investigators to get to it and work in the environment. beyond that as far as whether this -- whether the airplane is in the mountains or in a flat area, i haven't seen pictures yet. so i don't have that information. >> based on what little we do know at this point, what conditions might have contributed to this crash? >> the information so far is that the weather was good. and so that doesn't appear that it would be one of the contributing factors. it's something the investigators will certainly look at. but it doesn't appear at this point. the airplane was at 31,000 feet. that puts it well above any of the shoulder fired missile considerations. this is something that the security people will look at. but at 31,000 feet, the low

altitude, shoulder fired missiles would not be a consideration. so they're going to look at the fact that the airplane air speed was low. the fact that the airplane came down at a -- at a high rate of descent. they're going to look at the call from the crew to see if there was a technical problem on board. and bit by bit, the investigators will eliminate what it could be and they'll focus on what actually happened. >> okay. john, back to the plane. it's an airbus 321. what do we know about the plane and is it prone to problems? >> the airbus a-321 is the largest of the a-323 family. it can carry over 300 people, it can carry up to 50,000 pounds worth of fuel. it's a very reliable plane. it was the last of the a-320

family that was put into service. it's widely flown. it has a high reliability record, an extremely good safety record. it's a very, very comfortable airplane to fly. it's very highly regarded by airlines and pilots around the world. >> we do know that the plane was about 18 years old and operated by a small russian airline called metro jet that's based in western siberia. do we know anything about the airline or its safety record? >> the a-321 is operated by several airlines in that part of the world. metro jet, i don't have a lot of information on. it is the latest transformation from another russian company and the age of the airplane is kind of midlife. airplanes can fly for many, many years. it's dependent on the

maintenance quality and we don't have any of that information yet. so the russian civil authority will certainly be looking at the maintenance records of the airplane to see if there had been any previous problems with it. there are some reports that are not yet confirmed that this particular airplane had a tail strike earlier at some point in its career, but that's several years ago. that probably doesn't mean anything. it was a bit of history. but beyond that, that's all we have at this point. >> john cox, thank you so much for that. right now we'll turn to our senior -- former senior british officer mikey kay. the wreckage has been found in an area where egyptian forces are fighting the islamic militant insurgency. there's been no indication that the plane was brought down by a deliberate act. but mikey kay, what is your take on this because of the area? >> i think the -- the reporting so far indicates that the

aircraft had some sort of technical failure. whether that's a catastrophic technical failure or a technical failure led to the catastrophic event, we are yet to determine. so i think from the shootdown perspective we can pretty much rule that out. as john already alluded to, there is -- when you have insurgencies in these areas, there is a propensity for insurgent groups to get the man pads, the shoulder launch missiles. you look at the stinger missiles which is prevalent among the insurgents, and the russian jet, it was around 31,000 feet so it's well out of the range of those type of systems so i think then the next important component to look at is the search and recovery area.

i think as has been alluded to, that potentially is fraught with problems with getting the investigative teams into the search area. not just for the recovery of bodies and parts, but also the black boxes. i think that's certainly something that the egyptian military have to place a high emphasis on. the sinai province has been operating in sinai over the last 12 months. they recently affiliated themselves with the islamic state and they have been hitting the egyptian army over the last 12 months with suicide bombs and suicide bomb ieds. they recently targeted in july an egyptian frigate with an antitank missile. it didn't sink the frigate though. so i think they're active in the region and i think that will play quite a high priority with the egyptian authorities when conducting the search and rescue. >> the sinai was under israeli

control from 1973 until it was returned to egypt in 1982. how has egypt been able to maintain control of this area? >> well, i think egypt over the last couple of years has had real problems ever since president al sisi won the election. he's had a serious problem on the western flank with libya. we know that the islamic state are pervasive across that area and there's a government and a security vacuum. and he's got gaza, and he's got the sinai peninsula islamic insurgent group there. so president al sisi has had a major problem on his hands when it comes to the security of that area. >> we do know this is a mountainous region and a desolate, uninhabited area. how difficult is the search and rescue going to be in that area?

>> i think potentially it's quite hazardous. flight radar 24 were reporting the track of the aircraft and they show that it gets airborne from sharm el sheikh and it tracks the eastern coastal line of the sinai peninsula initially and then kinks left and parallels the israeli border as it heads up to arish. that's a town on the mediterranean and then it was due to contact the cyprus radar. as the technical problems have become compounded, the reports indicate that the pilot then contacted the arish international airport to whatma diversion into the airport and it approached from the south into arish. >> when you have a crash like this and you have the area that we're discussing because you have egypt, you have saudi arabia, you have jordan, you

have israel, we know it's a very contentious area right now. obviously, one of the things you look at is a military presence. do you think that's any indication that militant groups operating in that area would have the capability to take down a flight traveling at that altitude in that area? >> no, i don't think. if we contrast it with the malaysian airlines that was shot down the eastern ukraine, that was a buck missile system. it has a tracking radar, it's got a significant booster within the missile and it can reach altitudes in excess of 30,000 feet. that's where the danger lies. i think the risk analysis on this part of the group is that the insurgent groups if they can get their hands on anything, it would be like a man portable air defense system which has a service ceiling when it comes to

transporting at higher altitudes. the stinger missiles, the sa-7, sa-9, man portable sa-14, those have a service ceiling of around 10 to 15,000 feet, which isn't halfway to what the altitudes at what the air transit is at. so taking that into consideration, obviously, i think aircraft will avoid flying over syria at the moment for all the news that pervades at the moment and it seems that the airways path is taking it north within the sinai air space up into the mediterranean into cyprus, turkey, and then into st. petersburg. yes, will this raise questions on the, you know, on the levels of security, safety and security over the region? yes, i think that question will be asked, but i think for the reasons i just mentioned we may not see too much of a -- an altercation in current policy in

the area. >> thank you so much for weighing in, former british senior military office, michael kay. right now, we'll turn to ron mott. monitoring the situation from london. ron, what have you learned? >> good morning, again, dara. well, i'm looking at the flight returns, the radar returns and it would indicate to me as a pilot that before this plane lost its radar signal that there was some oscillating of the aircraft where it was doing one of these up in the air at flight level 27, up to flight level 30,000 feet in the air. obviously, something went wrong. we are getting reports from the associated press, quoting a member of the aviation community there that the pilot did make a distress call and requested landing at the nearest airport. now, we are told that there were 217 passengers on the plane, seven crew members, reuters is reporting that officials on the ground search and rescue officials on the ground have numbered more than 100 bodies that they have recovered including some children. that if there are any survivors they will be taken to suez and

cairo hospitals. but i think it's going to be interesting as this investigation unfolds as to exactly what happened at altitude to cause this plane to not only lose altitude rather rapidly, but also air speed. according to this flight data report i have here, they were traveling at about 406 knots and the last radar reading was at 62 knots that's a precipitous drop in air speed. so the flight crew is fighting whatever they're contending with in the cockpit to try to regain control of the aircraft. i can tell you, there are some reports, we have not yet confirmed them at nbc news, about survivors. we have not confirmed that. it seems that the plane apparently, according to one of the witnesses on the ground, split into two and that's the scene that we are understanding that they're dealing with at this point. so it does sound like this was a controlled crash as much as you'd want to be able to control a crash and that hopefully there

are people who will survive this ultimately, but right now, we don't know of any survivors officially. again, 224 souls on board that aircraft. >> ron mott reporting from london, thank you so much. yes, again, we are hoping there are survivors on board. let's hope the next details you bring will be that. let's bring in tom costello. what are investigators looking at when they see this plane and the flight data recorder possibly when that's that found? >> you're right, the flight data recorder and the cockpit voice recorder, those are critical to picking up. so the egyptian military or whoever is able to recover the wreckage will be clearly focusing on that once they have dealt with the victims of this crash. i think there's a lot -- at this point, this investigation is wide open. so in no particular order they'll look at the weather conditions at the time. at the moment all of those are reported to be -- have been normal and fine for flight.

they'll look at the history of this particular airbus a-321. who serviced it, where was it serviced? who had the last contact with this particular plane and what about the engines in particular and where were they serviced and by whom? the engines we don't know yet if this was a g.e. configuration or a pratt and whitney conferiation on the a-321. this is a very good plane with a very reliable reputation. this is the biggest plane in the a-320 fleet. made by airbus in europe an it's flown as a work horse around the world. really carrying passengers, these longer distances. for example, from sharm el sheikh all the way up to st. petersburg, russia. that's a good flight indeed. 18 years old, that's considered to be really kind of a midlife in the life of a plane. not particularly old. as long as the plane is maintained well. you know, very often these planes are actually leased by the airline. so question is who was the actual holder of the lease? and very often whoever holds the

leases demands that the person who's leasing it or the company, the airline that's leasing it, maintain these planes at a very good -- at a very good record and the reason for that is because eventually the people who hold the lease, the people who own the plane, they actually want to go ahead and sell them at some point. so it's in everybody's interest to maintain these planes and ensure they're operating at peak capacity and ability. you know, there was some discussion about the rate of descent, 6,000 to 7,000 feet per minute. that's a good rate of descent, but not out of the realm of normal. however, the ground speed appears to have slowed quite considerably. at one point down to 95 knots on the ground speed which is candidly too slow to fly. so if the plane was suddenly descending at 6,000 to 7,000 feet per minute and slowing at the same time, the question is did the cockpit have any control over this plane? i think the initial and i want to underscore that, the initial

reporting would suggest that maybe this crew was in fact trying to maintain control of this plane as it descended. we know there's some reporting out there that perhaps the pilot had said he'd try to make it to the nearest airfield. if they managed to get this down in an orderly descent down to the sinai desert, we don't kno. so the issue is for investigators to try to piece it back together again. >> speaking about that, tom, we know that the airplane was going at about 400 knots and it slowed down to 95, which you're talking about. when they're looking for clues from the data controller what are they looking for specifically? what could have gone wrong in the flight that would have made a possible computer glitch, a flight wire issue, what are the specific things they would be looking at to see what made the airline actually slow down as it was descending? >> i think they have to look at engine performance. if that is what they are -- if that's in fact the situation,

the scenario, and by the way it's amazing how much data we can get now simply based on the telemetry fed into for example flight radar 24 which shares it with everybody. if they can confirm the fact that this plane did in fact slow rather dramatically as it's in the rate of descent, the question is going to be, well, what happened? why did it suddenly start slowing down and was this in fact almost like a glider and if that's the case, then are we looking at a situation where they lost one or both engines? that clearly would have to be among the things that the investigators will be looking at. >> well, like you mentioned this is still very early on in the investigation. we have many details pouring in right now and many details to follow. we'll go to a quick break and bring you up to date on the political news and a new poll number for hillary clinton. plus, more on this top story. egyptian search and rescue crews in the sinai peninsula report they have found the crash site of the russian airliner. we'll be right back. active management can tap global insights.

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if you're just joining us, a russian airliner with more than 200 people on board has crashed in sinai peninsula. it took off from sharm el sheikh at the southern tip of the sinai, headed for st. petersburg, russia, just before 6:00 a.m. local time. it disappeared from radar 23 minutes after takeoff. an egyptian aviation official said that the pilot had reported technical difficulties before losing contact with air traffic controllers. search and rescue teams are at the scene in central sinai. also, this developing news, the american commitment in the war against isis is taking a new turn. the first time american troops will be based inside war torn syria. in northern syria fewer than 50

american special operation forces will battle isis. in northern iraq, the u.s. military plans to have a rapid action force to pack up u.s. troops and allies and there will be more air strikes launched from turkey by more aircraft including f-15 bombers and low-flying war hogs. the white house laid out a need for ground forces. >> i wouldn't underestimate that capability and capacity of our u.s. special operations forces to be an important force multiplier anywhere around the world they're deployed. the president does expect that they can have an impact in intensifying our strategy for building the capacity of local forces inside of syria to take the fight on the ground in isil in their own country. luke russert is at the white house. the white house has consistently said it would not put u.s. troops on the ground, so how is

the white house justifying this turn? >> good morning, well, it was increasingly apparent that the situation on the ground in syria was spiraling out of control. and that's what really caused the white house to make an adjustment here. now, the number is small, 50 commandos, but the commandos can partner with moderate groups on the ground, groups that have a proven track record of combating isis and give the united states and our allies a best opportunity at trying to procure a more secure situation there in syria. it will be -- it remains to be seen. i covered capitol hill daily. i went around to different members of congress and asked for their opinions on this yesterday. almost to a person everybody would privately admit this is almost too little, too late. and there's this fear of mission creep. 50 advisers here, a hundred next month, what happens? it's an open ended commitment. this is also being done under the 2001 authorization for use of military force that was originally to go into afghanistan and the war on terror.

that's a lot of angst in congress that perhaps the administration should have an aumf for this specific campaign. so the other role here is to combat what russia has done. russia has moved into syria. has propped up the president assad. the united states now propping up proxy groups that are going against assad, also against isis. it's messy, it's complicated. but you're starting to see a u.s. show of force to go against putin a little bit here in syria. >> luke, you mentioned that there was reaction on the hill and that people were commenting on their opinions about this. was anybody surprised by this sudden move or was this sort of in the works before but nobody was really talking about it? >> well, there was i think a little bit of surprise at the number. a lot of people felt that after the pentagon had that failed program where they had attempted to prop up moderate groups and after years and millions of dollars they were only able to get a few. the commitment would be larger.

and a lot of people say when you have 50, it doesn't amount for that much. and they're going to be there to train and assist and they're not going in on raids. there's a lot of talk on the hill. this is just the opening salvo. this is something that will get a lot of hill attention. you will see a lot of the relevant committees want to get progress reports, about what the troops are doing. but the most important thing is that you have at least 50 young americans putting themselves in harm's way without congress essentially approving that. that is something that senators and representatives will make the white house keenly aware of every time they have a discussion about this. >> luke russert reporting live from the white house, thank you. coming up more on the top story. egyptian search and rescue crews in the sinai peninsula. they're reporting they found the crash site of the russian airliner. the latest when we come back. you can't predict... the market. but at t. rowe price, we can help guide your investments through good times and bad.

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a russian airliner with more than 220 people on board has crashed in egypt's sinai peninsula. the plane an airbus a' -- a-321 took off from sharm el sheikh headed for st. petersburg, russia, just before 6:00 a.m. local time. it disappeared from radar 23 minutes after takeoff. the egyptian aviation officials say it had reported technical difficulties before losing contact with the air traffic controllers. the rescuers are at the scene. now to turn to politic and a reunion. jeb bush and marco rubio are making their pitch to voter at the iowa gop growth and opportunity party in des moines today. it's the first time since appearing in the same place since wednesday's cnbc debate. for jeb bush he is looking to reboot his campaign and his

chief officer has left. hallie jackson, you're a few miles outside of des moines where marco rubio will hold the town hall. what should we expect after the clashes between bush and rubio? >> reporter: right, marco rubio a couple of hours outside of des moines, will be heading up for this big rally that we're seeing a lot of candidates at. all of these folks have to prove to voters that they can actually win. but jeb bush has a lot on the line here. he's not to show that he can reset. he's got to show he has a path to victory after a last place debate finish in the new poll. jeb bush tailgating with his game face on. >> this is jeb bush. >> reporter: but playing from behind with a new nbc news surveymonkey online poll showing he did the worst in the debate. the win going to ted cruz and marco rubio a close second. rubio, now responding to a leaked bush campaign memo that outlines an attack strategy against him. >> i don't think it's a smart

thing for republicans to the hillary clinton's job for her. one of the reasons we lost in 2012 is republicans attacking each other. >> reporter: he's picking up new support from a mega donor which is is a blow to bush whose campaign let go of the chief operating officer on friday. along with a slew of others, many of them lashing out after this week's debate. >> i think it was a sort of flagrant example of media bias. >> reporter: angry campaigns set to meet sunday to compare complaints about the cnbc showdown. not invited -- the republican national committee which is calling cnbc's questions mean spirited, gotcha and petty. but the business network owned by the same parent company as ours has said people who want to be president of the united states should be able to answer tough questions. now the rnc is announcing it's

suspending the partnership with nbc news and telemundo for a debate later this winter. nbc calling that a disappointing development, but promising to work in good faith to resolve this with the republican party. the next debate less than two weeks away. bush will be looking for a comeback, cruz and rubio on the other hand will be looking to keep that momentum up that they have been building and translate that support into support at the polls. back to you. >> hallie jackson, ready for a busy day in iowa. thank you. joining me now for analysis is ed o'keeffe, from "the washington post." good morning. >> good morning. >> ed, you and your colleagues have been following up with several bush advisers and donors since the cnbc debate. one prominent bush donor from the midwest wrote in an e-mail i don't see the fire in the belly that he needs to move through the brutal primary battles, and that's a punch. is that a consensus among the

supporters? >> let's start with the coo. some suggested that she departed friday, i'm told that it was in the works a few weeks ago before the shakeup began about ten days ago when they started sort of cutting back staff and whether it was directly related to the troubles that remains to be seen. it was a very administrative position. it wasn't involved with raising money or political strategy. but the news comes at a bad time because as you saw there donor, supporters, expressing big concerns with bush's ability to stand on that stage and attack his opponents, draw some contrast and as that donor points out, prepare to take on the democratic nominee who will likely be hillary clinton. there's a lot of belief that bush is capable of doing so, but debates have a way of setting the tone and helping voters make decisions. there's a belief if he can't take on marco rubio who at one time was a protege, sort of a

mentee, why does he think he's capable of taking on hillary clinton, someone who's been doing this political combat for more than two decades? >> let's make a switch to rnc's decision to suspend the partnership with nbc and telemundo. up to this point, telemundo was the only spanish network to host a debate. how does this play to the block of supporters? >> donald trump has been issue number one, story number one on spanish language broadcasts across the country for months. so any word that the rnc is pulling back certainly will continue to lead that coverage. you know, part of this seems to have been the fact that so many of these campaigns were getting ready to meet tomorrow without an rnc representative to talk about how the debates have gone so far. and the concern was that some of these candidates would say, you know what? we're not showing up for the things anymore. we'll do our own forums or host our own debates so the rnc had to exert some influence and some power over the whole process by

at least for now punishing nbc by suggesting that this debate won't happen. i believe given and this isn't to sort of, you know, fluff your peacock feathers but given you're the largest, most watched news organization in the country, and given that telemundo connection, the fact there's no other debate being hosted by republicans on a spanish language network this is probably going to have to be worked out. you're right, independent voters and democrats will say, republicans aren't willing to answer tough questions, not asked by people who work for conservative publications or conservative channels? you know, are they ready to be president? so i suspect this will be worked out. a lot of this is driven by concerns of the campaigns themselves about how the process has been, you know, managed. the fact that the debates are long. the fact that there's no sense of what kind of questions will be asked. we'll see if it works out. >> well, definitely, some hurdles to jump there. ed o'keeffe, political reporter for "the washington post," thank you for your time this morning.

>> take care. well, coming up, much more on our top story. egyptian search and rescue crews are reporting they have found the crash side of the russian airliner. the latest when we come back. but the quicksilver card from capital one likes to keep it simple. real simple. i'm talking easy like-a- walk-in-the-park, nothing-to-worry-about, man-that-feels-good simple. quicksilver earns you unlimited 1.5% cash back on every purchase, everywhere. it's a simple question. what's in your wallet? it takes a lot of work... but i really love it.s. i'm on the move all day long... and sometimes, i just don't eat the way i should. so i drink boost® to get the nutrition that i'm missing. boost complete nutritional drink has 26 essential vitamins and minerals, including calcium and vitamin d to support strong bones and 10 grams of protein to help maintain muscle. all with a great taste.

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shut your mouth and say goodnight mouthbreathers. breathe right welcome back to "weekends with alex witt." breaking news, the pilot of the russian airliner that crashed in the sinai peninsula had reported technical difficulties before losing contact with air traffic controllers. the plane had more than 220 people on board. all reportedly russian passengers. it took off from sharm el sheikh at the southern tip of the sinai peninsula and was headed to st. petersburg, russia, just before 6:00 a.m. local time. it disappeared from radar 23 minutes after takeoff. search and rescue teams are at the wreckage site as we speak. nbc's ron mott is monitoring the story from london. good morning, what can you tell us? >> good morning, dara. as you mentioned this flight has been confirmed to have crashed

in the northern region of sinai. what we can tell you, there were 217 passengers, 17 of those children along with seven crew members. and what might be interesting if the black boxes, when they are recovered, if the pilot did in fact transmit some sort of trouble in flight, what specifically was that trouble? i have been looking over the radar returns here from flight data -- flight radar 24, one of online websites that you can follow and track flights in realtime. and this plane seemed to be at a rather level altitude at under 31,000 feet when something went wrong and suddenly the plane started diving and then it started climbing again and diving and climbing again. before it vanished off of radar. the air speed at the time that it returned its last radar beep was just 62 knots. that is very, very, very slow for a plane of this size. this is is an airbus a-321, a very reliable aircraft in the

aviation community. 18 years old, which as our tom costello who follows the things closely reports is a mid age aircraft. so we wouldn't certainly suspect that there were airframe issues with the plane being 18 years old, but the russians are obviously looking at the maintenance records of this metro jet a-321. and we should also report that president vladimir putin this morning has declared tomorrow november 1st as a day of mourning in that country. we understand that family members of people on this plane have been gathering this morning at the airport in st. petersburg, russia. as you mentioned, this plane disappeared 23 minutes after taking off from sharm el sheikh and we suspect that most of the passengers if not all of them were down there vacationing and on their way back home after a holiday. there in the very popular resort city of sharm el sheikh. obviously they never got to where they were going this morning in st. petersburg, russia. just to recap, the plane did crash, it disappeared from radar. there was some confusion earlier

in the morning that when the handoff was to take place, the flight was being handled in egypt and they were transferring the atc over to cyprus, the plane never made connection with cyprus, but there was some report that it in fact did make a connection with the new handoff atc tower. that was apparently not the case. 224 people on board, 217 of them passengers, seven crew. dara, back to you. >> those picture of the family members at the airport are heart breaking. ron mott reporting live from london. let's bring in a former national safety transportation board member and he writes for aviation news. thank you for being here. based on what we know at this point, what should the investigators be looking at? >> they'll leave no stone unturned and first on the scene will put maximum effort at finding the recorders. this airbus airplane is known to have robust recorders so they'll yield a tremendous amount of information.

assuming they're working. and then they're going to do an initial sight inspection, where's the debris field, coming down from the altitude it's scattered far and wide, so it will take time to find and identify all the pieces. and if reports -- news reports about the activities of some dissident egyptian groups in the area, that may complicate their work. >> assuming the flight data recorders are recovered, how will that impact the pace of this investigation? >> it could have a big impact on the pace, depending on what information is on there. the last report had the airplane climbing and diving repeatedly with a 62 knot air speed. well, that's an aerodynamic stall, so the airplane is not poing to fly going that slow. it doesn't rule out pilot error at this point. so the sky's the limit right now

and the recorder will give us the direction to go. >> john golia, thank you so much for your input. and was advisers on the way to syria, what is the new american strategy in the region? that's coming up next. how do you stay on top of your health? ahh... ahh... cigna customers have plan choices and tools to take control. so they're more engaged, with fewer high health risks and lower medical costs. take control of your health at cigna dot com slash take control. 40% of the streetlights in detroit, at one point, did not work. you had some blocks and you had major thoroughfares and corridors

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welcome back. developing now this morning, overseas secretary of state john kerry is in a vienna meeting with world leaders over the escalating situation in syria. a barrage of missiles slammed into the city. this as there's a commando headed there announced by the white house that took many by surprise. they'll be in northern syria and that's a rapid reaction force in northern iraq and there's more turkish-based aircraft taking off. colonel jack jacobs has more on this. what is this plan supposed to accomplish?

>> well, i think the impetus for the plan was the alliance between russia and iran who are heavily involved on the ground and in the air against the opponents of assad in syria. we're supporting those who are trying to overturn assad so we're obviously on opposite ends of this. but iran and russia actually have people in the region conducting air strikes and conducting operations on the ground. and we look very, very impotent in contrast. as a result, i think setting something unlike this, articulating that we're -- we're actually going to have people on the ground i think from the white house -- white house's perspective takes a little bit of a pressure off us. it looks like we're not impotent and we're actually doing something. i think that's one of the big motivations here, dara. >> well, the russian foreign minister sergei laugh rov has

called for cooperation. what about the high proxy risk. >> well, there's got to be some coordination between the russians on the one hand and us on the other because we're sharing air space. we have people on the ground. there's always the possibility of a big mistake here. don't forget that the russians and the iranians and the assad regime are all targeting opponents of the assad regime and that includes the people we're supporting. so there's always the possibility that there's a problem with coordination that's absolutely essential. >> do you think russian intervention in syria forced the hand of the u.s.? >> oh, yeah, i think. don't forget, there's a lot more going on. i know we talked about sending people there. we had people on the ground from time to time, but we're talking about publicly talking about sending another 50 people there. that's an incremental increase. and our mission hasn't changed

either. so i -- i don't think that you're talking about a very big difference from what it was a couple of days ago. >> colonel jack jacobs, military analyst, thank you. the republican battle for the white house shifts back to iowa, but two major contenders won't be there. that's up next. i've got two reasons to take care of my heart. that's why i take meta. meta is clinically proven to help lower cholesterol. try meta today. and for a tasty heart healthy snack, try a meta health bar.

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it is a reunion of sorts for republican candidates in iowa this morning. some of the candidates gave us a glimpse of what to expect at a rally at the state yesterday. >> on the very first day, i would place a call to vladimir putin and if we're still getting the problems that we have now, i would set up a no fly zone in

syria. and mr. putin, don't fly in, don't test me. >> i am hillary clinton's worst nightmare. >> i'm actually very proud to be part of a large field of republican candidates, one out of six republicans are running for president this year. >> casey, good morning. what should we expect from today's event? >> reporter: we're expecting almost all of the republican presidential candidates, but two two key ones are going to be missing, we're not going to see donald trump or ben carson today, but we are going to the see jeb bush and marco rubio on the same stage and they have been tuszing on the same stage. with jeb bush supporters kochbtding to attack marco rubio behind the scenes, marco rubio's

booth is going to be a tailgate theme. jeb bush is going to have some family members with him. it's pretty rare that we see him out on the trail with family members. but the question is how is this krod going to receive especially marco rubio. i think it's going to be an interesting barometer to see if he's to the one this crowd is particularly paying attention to. jeb bush has a more difficult road in iowa, his profile has never been one the to fit the state and he's been focusing his efforts on new hampshire. >> what's the morale in both campaigns, how are they feeling today? >> reporter: well, rubio's campaign is obviously still riding a little bit high off of of today's performance, they actually just received the backing of a major financeir.

he's also thinking about considering backing jeb bush and bush's people had courted him pretty aggressively, but it's a pretty significant sign that the winds may be mupushing in bush' favor. >> you mentioned donald trump and ben carson are not there, do you think their campaigns are going to suffer by not having them involved in thissome. >> so far trump or carson's campaign have not suffered from lack of appearance. trump has had two major rallyings in the last week or so so it's not as though he has no presence here in iowa. and ben carson has been able to move up in the polls without doing the things some of the other candidates are doing and that seems to be working for them so far.

that wraps up this hour of weekends with alex witt. richard louie is up next with that plane crash while investigators are racing to the scene. can a business have a mind? a subconscious.

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get 15 gigs for the price of 10. and now get $300 credit for every line you switch. now at at&t plane crash in egypt. a very good morning the to you, thanks for getting up with us, i'm richard louie, a russian plane carrying 200 people which we have been watching for you on msnbc on this saturday morning, and it's crash in egypt's sinai peninsula in an area in which egyptian security forces have been battling islamic militants. let's go right to ron mott in