f you can follow me on twitter and instagram. the news continues now with richard loui. >> at 6:00 a.m. your name is going to look big. a big reason for folks to get up. f. >> folks coming in from the bars. >> thank you, my friend. good afternoon to all of you. here in new york city, we're going to start with a a defiant new message that came in from president trump. moments ago this in the wake of the u.s. and iran showdown. a day after sending over notification to congress about the killing of iran general qasem soleimani there's no longer necessary for future actions. now this is the tweet. he says, these media posts will serve as notification to the united states congress that should iran strike my u.s. person or target, the united states will quickly and fully

strike back and perhaps in a disproportionate manner. such legal notice is not required, but is given nevertheless. now this tweet comes as the president was dealing with some backlash over some other tweets that he put up over the weekend. it upped the ante with threats to very specific 52 iranian sites including some important to iranian culture. if iran retaliates. that's in part. this morning democrats question the president's rational behind the decision to conduct the deadly operation. listen to this. we don't know the reasons that it had to be done b now. they don't seem clear. the document they sent us last night is very unsatisfying as to that, even though i can't talk about it. the whole thing is classified. >> whatever they are doing is unusual here. >> the responsibility is on the administration to prove to us that by taking out the second most powerful political figure

inside iran, they are preventing more attacks rather than inspiring additional attacks. >> we are not safer because donald trump had soleimani killed. we are closer to the edge of war. the question is why white now? and the the administration simply can't keep their story straight. >> the fallout from the killing of general soleimani continued in the middle east with iraq's parliament today voting to expel troops from its country. while iran confirming it will move full steam ahead on uranium enrichment. we started the show here with what the president just put out within the last moments here. there's a lot of things he's saying here. this is a legal notification.

>> i'm not sure this is quite legal. i think we have to talk to more about that. but what this says that we're in an unprecedented time. we think back to the iraq war days. this is far from anything that would have been during that time. and over the past couple days, it's really been a tit for tat between the u.s. and iranians on twitter. so we're all scrambling to figure out what the line of communication is like they usually communicate. but it seems to be all on twitter. >> in addition what he's saying here, the idea of disproportionate lly typically we're discussing the issue of proportionalty. >> i think what we know over the past couple days, there's been some confusion in the national security surk thes and intelligence community about whether or not this attack on soleimani was proportional to

anything the iranians had done to the the u.s. there's continued conversation about what's to come. is the u.s. planning anything proportional to the iranian rocket attacks that we have seen in baghdad over the past couple days. this is a real fear among national security officials that the white house will not act in the coming days. >> and over to you here, chris. as you are looking at the military action that has happened within the last 24 hours, when we were speaking yesterday at this time, we had already seen at least three different attacks, rockets there that were landing in the baghdad area. what's happened in the last 24 hours since we last spoke? >> there are just recently new reports of rockets landing inside the green zone. there have been no confirmation of casualties or even damage, but it's the latest sign of the

tension surrounding iraq and all of the fallout since soleimani was killed in the drone strike. if you talk to people on the ground in the middle east like in lebanon where i am right now, virtually no one will say they want more conflict or want to go to war. but they will see things like donald trump has fired the first shot. now more is inevitable. if you take what happened today in beirut, where the leader of hezbollah was delivering memorial speech, a eulogy for his dear friend, where he condemned donald trump and called out specifically the united states military saying that they had blood on their hands and that they were going to face some severe consequences. while this was going on, we spoke to people in the streets who said simply, we're desperate. at this point, we have very few other options now lebanon doesn't want to go to war. they are facing a severe

economic crisis that would totally destabilize the country and the rest of the region. by and large, feels the same way. a lot of people feel like they don't have r very many options. >> not very many options here. are there not very many options? >> i think as we have heard over the past couple days and hours that president trump received a menu of options about what to do with iran. and i think that these options have been on the table for quite some time. not only in the trump administration and the obama administration, in the bush administration, but what seems to be the concern right now at least within the sources that we're talking to within the national security community is now that these rocket attacks are happening outside the green zone, there seems to be an up tick in violence, will president trump act erratically. some people described the hit on soleimani as erratic. officials on the ground in iraq are particularly concerned about

what the white house will do next. especially kurdish officials that were in parliament today voting on whether or not to kick out u.s. troops from the u.s. in fear that something will happen. >> thank you so much. appreciate you both for starting the show. secretary of state mike pompeo is among many senior white house officials who say qasem soleimani's death is in the best interest of national security. but many are questioning the decision. joining us is "new york times" torner correspondent. thank you r for being with us. >> thank you for having me. >> let's go straight to r your reporting here. i'll read the title. "as tension with iran escalated, trump opted for most extreme measure." as these situations, the president receives these white

papers, these suggestions. he has options. and then he selects based on that odds. and the report he selected something that was more severe than the other options. is that right? >> that's right. a couple days after christmas, which is when the rocket attack occurred, president trump was given a menu of options with the killing of soleimani as the most far out extreme option. at that point in time, he did not choose that course. what happened next was a series of strikes against allies with iranian proxies. a couple days after that, when there was the attack on the wall of the u.s. embassy, president trump was fuming in his office. he was just set and suddenly he landed on whad people around him and officials have spoken to us described as a really extreme

course of action. >> how close to the intercircle with these sources without you giving out those names? >> it's hard for me to answer that question. just report iing by myself and several colleagues at "the new york times" who have confirmed basically the same thing, which is that this was considered something that was very on the edge. very extreme. >> you have heard from the administration, from secretary of state mike pompeo and trump this was to avert an eminent attack or action that was about to happen from or led by iranians. what was that eminence? what was the information behind that eminent attack? >> the sources we have spoken to

who have been briefed on this matter and had access to the classified information say the intelligence indicating for this was eminent was thin at best. one official i spoke to tribed it as razor thin. what the president was presents was a couple things. he was traveling in iraq and syria and lebanon meeting proxies of iran known to have a confrontational relationship there was a conversation between the general and the supreme leader in iran that was intercepted. and in which you hear the general asking for the supreme leaders for a a major operation, but crucially, the supreme leaders said, you know what, i want you to come to tehran for further consultations. so that in and of itself indicates that whatever operation there was, whether it was aimed at u.s. interests or

not had not yet been approved by the supreme leader of iran. and that conversation was at least a week before soleimani's death. so it seems to be a reach there was an eminent us attack planned. >> no now that we're looking forward to it, what do you expect? this sans of the killing and what does that mean in terms of what it will do now in his 80s. if. >> that's one of the difficult scenarios here. really, the goal is the support. he needs to decide how he's going to react to this. it seems to me to be implausible they would not react. this is such a major prove vags. the killing of soleimani, the

number two leader in this country. a couple other things going forward, i covered isis this whole time. the coalition announced they are calling off for now, they are pausing the fight against isis in iraq because they need to use resources to protect the embassy and to protect military compounds throughout the cou country. so that has a secondary effect. that kind of action is bound to help the group in the attempts to rebuild. >> weft the iraqi parliament saying the united states forces must get out. the timeline is to be determined. the president needing to sign that. the president in iraq is what i'm alluding to. that will happen. how does this all come together when we talk about international security in the region and what's going forward? big question and difficult to answer in one question. sg but if you can.

>> i think that it's clear that for american citizens in the region, this is not a good time. the u.s. em be sit has announced that american citizens in iraq should evacuate immediately by any means they can. and that is not just in iraq, but also in syria and lebanon in places where iran has its proxies. now whether the homeland is going to be under any kind of physical attack seems unb likely to me. but that's not that americans traveling overseas are at a heightened risk. >> quickly, moderates now are they moving towards an extreme there in iraq and iran? what moderates may have been? >> i think up with of the disappointing aspect os of this scenario is there was a long tussle between america. and just reedly, we have seen clashes in the streets of baghdad where protesters have

come out against iran, against the iranian influence there. whatever the actions that u.s. has taken has reversed that. now iran is being seen as the victim. and that is nots in favor of american interests in the region. >> thank you for your reporting as always. thank you so much. >> thank you so much for having me. breaking news also this hour here on msnbc in east africa. one u.s. service member and two defense contractors are among those killed after al shabaab extremists overran a military base in kenya. the base we're talking about is used by u.s. counterterrorism forces. it's the first known al shabaab attack against u.s. forces in kenya. the military says five attackers

were killed. leaders say the assault has nothing to do with the current situation in the middle east. >> reporter: the attack was repelled, unclear to what extent these assaults is affiliated with al qaeda penetrated the compound. there are 100 u.s. service personnel there. they use this as a base in kenya. 79 were killed in that bomb blast in downtown mogadishu. it's a complicated situation. you have had a weak central government in somalia facing a sophisticated organization in al shabaab. they have used examples of bracketing in service members with artillery. they have been flooding planes to get closer to causing damage.

bthere's been a handful of deats on this. this is probably the second largest. the largest death toll we have in the last initial black hawk down was when those four u.s. service members were caught in the green burr raies in an awful situation. here we have three dead, one u.s. service member and two contractors. it is a reminder, though, there are a lot of dangerous extremist groups out there. this is not aphiluated with the forces or hezbollah association. and it's a reminder the pentagon, the enemy gets a vote. >> hans, always good to have you. thank you so much. still ahead, amid-the fallout, the inspector of impeachment still looming large over president trump. and there's a big week ahead in the showdown between the house and the senate. he house and the senate

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breaking news, five people are dead and 60 ores jurd. this happened after a crash involve inging a tour bus. several 18-wheelers and a car as well. it happened on the pennsylvania turnpike. and how much do we know in terms of what the investigators are telling us about what caused this? it happened around 4:00 a.m.

this morning. it's about 40 miles southeast of pittsburgh. now investigators are highway heading to the scene to figure out what caused this crash. but state police in pennsylvania say that weather may have been a factor. now as we understand it, as we look at those horrifying images, we can see that the crash involved a bus as well as three tractor trailers. one of them you can see a fedex truck. and another passenger vehicle. now about 60 people were rushed to local hospitals and local police say what happened around 4:00 a.m. this morning is that that bus was going down a hill in rural pennsylvania and could not negotiate a curve and ended up on an embankment and two tral tort trailers collided with the bus. a third then hit a chain reaction situation. and you can see the damage that was left behind. the bus had originated here in

new york city. according to the owner of the bus company, it was taking people all the way to ohio. the victims range from 50 to 67 years old. thankfully most of the injured have been treated and released. but five people died and 60 were rushed to local hospitals. >> thank you for following that break news story. we'll get more developments. both houses of congress there back to work with the impeachment battle now the big headline. house speaker nancy pelosi is still holding on to the articles of impeachment. democrats and republicans are remaining at odds over how a senate trial should proceed.

>> showing he's working with the president. >> i hope she sends them over soon so we can get on with the trial. if she does not i would urge senator mcconnell to change the rules of the senate to proceed without nancy pelosi being involved. my goal is to start this trial in the next coming days. >> 57% of americans say the actions guarding ukraine or the refusal to cooperation, that's enough evidence to impeach and remove him from office. and a majority of americans want new witnesses to be allowed to participate in the trial as well.

>> we don't need the articles because we can't wait for them. what is your reaction to that. >> they changed rules. they do that when there's a supreme court nomination pending. and apparently they seem willing to counsider it in this importat case. what i heard from lindsey graham isn't so much he wants to get out of the trial. he wants to get on with the acquittal without any witnesses, without any testimony. he doesn't need any information. that may be the way he's going to look at it, but that's not the way the american people are looking at it. public opinion is moving on this issue. people want a fair process. they want the facts to determine the outcome, not the loyalty to

people like lindsey graham is sworn to his golf partner. that's wrong. >> the wait as nancy pelosi in the house, how long do you think she will wait and at what point do you believe it may be too long, this based on not only her processes that are written in the constitution for the impeachment process and then the trial, but also the political leverage that democrats may or may not have after a certain point in time? >> i don't think the calendar should dictate it. the document we should be looking at shouldn't be the clock or calendar, but the constitution. i'm with her. she's handled this exactly right. we should wait until we have an assurance that the constitution will be adhered to. if that takes mitch mcconnell longer than it should, i don't think we should pend bend to that because we're afraid there's some sort of tempt operation implication.

this is an important responsibility that we have. i don't think we should at any point in the process, whether initiating the inkwquiry, votin on impeachment or pushing through in a trial get caught up in the temporary politics of the moment. we're going to be measured in the long view of his rhode island on this and we ought to think about it that way. >> let's go to how woe yao might be measure d. you're from the great state of michigan as we move into 2020, what are constituents saying? i shared new polling. that number has increased. >> i do hear that a lot. i do hear from people who are big supporters of the president. but what i think they want, no matter what side of the question they are on, they want to process this. that's what i hear from people. they want us to do it in a

transparent way. clearly, the president has supporters. somehow they have greater influence. but i honest ly do think that oe of the concerns that we ought to be careful is get toog close to measuring public opinion in the moment. we really have to be the moment that we're in, may not be the only measure of whether or not this is the right step. sometimes we have to do the hard things, whether or not they are popular, knowing the future will judge us. >> i wanted to get your thoughts on the president's reelt stateme recent statement as far as notifying congress. he said, these immediamedia pos

serve as notification to the united states congress that should iran strike any u.s. person or target, the u.s. will strike back. what's your response, whether it's legal or not or the way he's saying he will notify congress? >> i'm not quite sure he understands how things work. article 1 of the constitution makes clear with the legislative branch has responsibility for. one of those is the declaration of war. i have serious reservations about whether the eminent threat that the president referred to when he decided to assassinate a foreign leader that that really was eminent. i want to know more. but the simple idea that he can send us a note and say, by the way, i'm getting ready to do this again if i feel like i want to, after some sort of response that warrants, he should come to congress and get the authorization for the use of military force that congress and congress alone can get him.

we have time to do that. we have time to hear what he has to say and to listen to people with the intelligence apparatus at their hands. this is a constitutional separation of powers. whether it was under president obama or president trump, many of us have grave concern about whether or not in the administration and executive can braunlaunch an article 2 war. there's no such thing in the constitution. >> dan, thank you. coming up, iran vowing to crush revenge for killing of top general qasem soleimani. we'll look at their military capabilities in the middle east and beyond. litary capabilities in the middle east and beyond no!

we need to keep moving. the whole things coming down. i can't see. i can't see! you need to trust me. jump!

sglmpltsz after the death of iran's top leader qasem soleimani the country has vowed revenge. so the question is how capable are they of doing that. we'll start with their military as we look at it. they are an estimated 523,000 active military personnel. this includes 350,000 in the regular army and then also about 150,000 in the islamic

revolutionary guard corp. you have 20,000 in the ircc. that core he did head the elite force before his death. iran's total military expenditure if you look at the numbers, that was estimated at 1 $19.6 billion. that includes over 6,000 tanks and combat vehicles, also 300 aircraft and 188 ships and submarin submarines. what could help iran the most are the tens of thousands of fighters who part of what you have heard to date the proxy groups, these groups that you see here on this graphic are designated as terrorist organizations. they include hezbollah, funded by iran, iraqi militias equipped

by iran. there's also hamas and a palestinian of factions. one of the most dangerous could come in the form of missiles. . the missile forces are among the largest in the middle east and include ten operational types of short and medium range missiles. iran is not believed at this moment to have any nuclear devices or weapons. but now leadership says they will not put anymore restrictions. they are moving full steam ahead. further rolling back commitment s to the 2015 nuclear deal. secretary of state mike pompeo spoke this morning about how the u.s. is now prepared for potential retaliation. take a listen. >> we have intelligence. we have lots of good observation of what's taking place. what we're doing is prepare iin for all possible courses of actions that the iranian regime may take and we are driving a strategy that we have had in place now for three years. diplomatic, economic, now military to convince the iranian b regime to behave like a normal

nation and to raise the cost when they inflict harm on america. >> joining us is jack jacobs and military analyst also me tail light of honor recipient, thank you for being with us. when you look at how we laid out what their arsenal is, what would be most concerning to you both in the region as well as we always think of in the united states and the homeland? >> i think they are unconventional forces. they have used them to great effect in the past. international shipping is terribly at risk from being attacked. even stopped by forces of iran and proxies in the gulf. we have seen it before and probably happen again. the use of unconventional forces is the most troubling. the use of rockets on our sites, the sites of our allies and so on, it's not the conventional forces that give us pause.

it's the unconventional forces. >> now the reporting is they do not have any nuclear capability, but as we understand, the entire recent years the debate has been about the iran nuclear deal. at which the united states pulled away from. how close are are are they to having a nuclear weapon? >> close enough to be stopped. it's not something that we are looking forward to. getting rid of the nuclear deal made it extremely difficult now to ensure that they will not have a weapon or a deliverable weapon. they are probably by the last estimate 18 to 24 months from having a viable nuclear weapon. but that doesn't trouble us as much as their capability to inflict damage on us and on our allies in the region. and that's very, very concerning to us. and we already have plans to evacuate our embassy in baghdad.

it's one of the reasons why the secondary bourn division is where it is. so our biggest threat is being run off by iran and allies and not having further influence net rethe region. >> as we finish this segment here, the u.s. military expenditure some close to $1 trillion just to give the comparison to the amount that's spent in iran which is close to $20 billion. the u.s. forces and what's invested in u.s. forces clearly much larger. jack jacobs, thank you so much, sir. one road that iran may take in their efforts to get revenge for the killing of qasem soleimani, we mentioned some of their arsenal. there's also cyber warfare. iran is considered to be a formidable adversary having already shown a willingness to g after government and civilian targets in the past. the bbc reporting that iran

began increasing their cyber capabilities in 2010 adding that the guard corp. is believed to have its own cyber unit and aimed at commercial and military etc. pespionage. thank you for being with us. when we look at this, how might they come after the united states? what might they do? >> well, we have seen examples before. they have come after the united states before. we have seen destructive campaign against the u.s. company where they destroyed servers and really did quite a bit of damage to that specific company. against the financial sector, they carried out a disruptive attack where they took down the banking sites of major u.s. financial companies. we have also seen since the nuclear deal, them shift away from u.s. targets. they shifted towards the gulf where they have continued to

refine and improve their capability, mostly focused on destroying critical infrastructure. >> one of the reported attacks was against a key political activist in that what they did was what's called that it took some $40 million for adele son to recover from that attack specifically. what is it? >> that's really the capability that they are most focused on. because we haven't seen them see them to the grid and manipulate a blackout. they are focused on getting into servers and just completely completing them. all the information is gone. >> it just disappears. >> it disappears. >> how do they do that? >> usually, they come in from a variety of means. we have seen them. one of the interest iing things

they do is they are adepth at using social networking. major incidents coming thee thr these approaches where they have fictitious personas that talk to a military officer. >> will they go after credit card companies? is that what they can affect an everyday more than? >> i think the best example of how they could affect everyday american asks what we're seeing palready in the united states with the ran b sm incidents. major mute nil palties have ground to a halt because their systems were completely locked up. there's no ransom being paid. >> thank you. we look at that for reaction to

the killing of qasem soleimani. thank you so much. >> thank you for having me. still ahead, less than 30 days a away from the iowa cau s caucuses. 29 days. which three democrats now in a dead heat. three democrats now ia dead heat. and save in more ways than one. for small prices, you can build big dreams, spend less, get way more. shop everything home at wayfair.com sleep this amazing? that's a zzzquil pure zzzs sleep. our liquid has a unique botanical blend, while an optimal melatonin level means no next-day grogginess. zzzquil pure zzzs. naturally superior sleep.

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the race for the white house is getting hotter. we're only 29 days away from the battleground state of iowa when they hold their caught caucuses.

6 of the candidates are there today trying to tie up the votes that they may need. new polling in iowa just out. new polling out about a month ago showing there's a three-way tie for first. 23-23-23. now followed there by when we look at this 16% and that is with warren and klobuchar. polling out of new hampshire shakes out with sanders on top, 27%, biden at 25%, warren at 18% and when you look at the margin of error, you can see how tight the races are. >> joining us is mike from iowa. mike, some people will say if you're below 15% because that's the key benchmark you needs in

the state that you're in right now to get voted on the caucuses, should you start to consider getting out of the state? >> you start to wonder who what to trust. elizabeth warren filling this room here. she's in the middle of q&a now taking questions. do you trust the polls that show is a closely matched campaign here in iowa. bernie sanders, pete buttigieg. or the conversations i have been having with voters. all of them boil down to the same thing. this is a close race. anybody can still come and win this thing. and with so many variables, it's important to consider what might happen yet.

it's put foreign policy in the conversation. we saw elizabeth warren talking with our colleague chuck todd. she's questioning president trump's political motivation. whether he's doing this to oversha kndow the impeachment tl in the coming weeks. joe biden in the last hour was asked whether he agrees with elizabeth warren. that's having an effect. so much up for grabs here as we get close here. look iing forward to that. thank you. still ahead, how might the united states escalating tensions with iran, how might that affect north korea's nuclear program. affect north k nuclear program. memory support brand. you can find it in the vitamin aisle in stores everywhere. prevagen. healthier brain. better life.

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1917 is a thrill-ride behind enemy lines. it only stops to reload. we need to keep moving. the killing of iran's top general qassem soleimani what happens inside the region as well as outside the region. key relationships, iran and china. iran and the north korean regime have long had nuclear ambitions as a goal and have worked together. and china and iran are trading partners and often join in joint military exercises and selling

equipment potentially to iran. here with me gordon an chan, a authorize of nuclear showdown, north korea takes on the world. so, what is not often known here, gordon, but you know well, is that north korea is a big proliferator of nuclear technology and a big customer and partner of north korea is iran. >> yeah, certainly. people estimate that iran pays north korea somewhere between 2 1/2 to $3 billion a year for their various forms of cooperation. most of that missiles because most of iran's missiles are north korean ones. but also that reactor in the syrian desert that the israelis destroyed in 2007, that was north korean in design. there were north koreans on-site from what we can tell. and syria did not have the money for it so everybody believes iran paid for the reactor. >> what about china and its ability to sell arms to iran? where is it now? we're in a different dynamic.

>> they did that through the a aq can. that network now is gone. the u.s. rolled it up. china has been selling iran components equipment material for their nuclear weapons program. they are probably out of that business now, but they have been doing that. and, of course, the north korea connection remains. >> so north korea specifically for a moment here, gordon, does this open up, if you're kim jong-un and you're looking at the united states now having an issue with the middle east, looking as the united states is on its heels potentially, therefore we'll move a little more aggressively, as they have been -- kim jong-un has in rhetoric. >> we have to expect this. we also have to expect that russia and china will move more aggressively because these countries do coordinate. they've worked together. and so what we're talking about is not an alliance, but a grouping. and this sort of looks like 1914 where you had countries not able

to manage a situation because they didn't know how firm the groupings were on both sides. well, they did come together at the last moment and history has said world war i. i'm not saying you have world war iii now, but this is difficult for anybody to manage and this could go off the rails pretty quickly especially because these bad groups are going to cooperate. >> as i said by president bush, the axis of evil, is it stronger since he coined the term, in the way they work together? >> that was controversial. iran and north korea worked closely together. they had in 2002 when bush talked about it. they do that now. the question is what is the coordination with china and russia. that is the added layer there which makes this even much more dangerous because the third member of that axis was iraq, which was really as we found out not to be the power we thought. but certainly china and russia, they're super states. they can actually cause and change things materially. >> gordon chang as always, i

appreciate you coming and giving us your insight as we try to connect the dots here with what's happening now in international security. appreciate it. that will do it for me this hour. join us back here next weekend as always. you can reach out to me via social media. give us your ideas, we'll get back to you. coming up next, stick around for this, politics nation with reverend al sharpton. sharpton

good evening and welcome to politics nation. tonight's lead, the count down is on. in just two days, the house of representatives will convene for the first time for the 116th congress second session. and all eyes will be on the democrat and republican leadership to see how they will solve the issue of impeachment that has been in a state of stand-off, a crisis mode, an impasse, a political crisis. all that with the iowa caucuses just four weeks away and democratic candidates on the campaign trail continuing to push to convince voters to pick them out of the pack. a pack that has become much less diverse recently. and later on in the show, is there