a powerful blast and gunfire are reported outside a major u.s. outpost in afghanistan the very same back room air base that donald trump paid a surprise visit to less than 2 weeks ago that news comes as a damning report comes out shedding light on how top american officials have been routinely distorting facts and figures on the war in afghanistan and an attempt to convince the public the drawn out war is winnable. also this hour the french government revealed more details on controversial pension reforms that have sparked mass strikes. and the u.s. president says he looks forward to more dialogue with russia after meeting foreign minister sergey lavrov at the white house visit however triggered more speculation

about suppose of the secret trump telling something well brawl. might as well. as against russian diplomats posing the case with the athletes and for our criminal liability. here watching our 2 international coming to life from the russian capital where it's just turned 4 pm welcome to the program. a suicide attacker has designated a car bomb outside the baghran air base one of the main u.s. military outposts in afghanistan they talk comes not long after trump surprise thanksgiving visit to the same base local media reports say the powerful blast hit a medical facility close to the bases main gate at least 2 people were killed and more than 70 injured according to local sources should out quickly followed and it's still continuing it's being reported 3 of the attackers remain at large and 3 others have been killed and another can. shared a local t.v.

channel for the taliban has claimed responsibility for the attack the american president visited the air base in late november for thanksgiving speaking to the military personnel there trump struck an upbeat tone. with the help of the devotion everyone. has given here tonight america is winning again we are winning like we have not wanted to a long time and you know what we're respected like we haven't been respected in a long time america is winning again and america is respected again and respected at the highest level. we're now joined live by a lawyer and middle east expert that donald trump was at this very base 2 weeks ago giving those assurances that we're winning this attack undermine that message. thanks for having me of course it undermines because donald trump was saying that he was winning that most american presidents since the the american invaded

afghanistan says that they are winning but they are not winning in fact because the taliban is controlling half of afghanistan and after 18 years of war with afghanistan trying to the taliban from afghanistan the united states has come to the conclusion that they have to negotiate and we negotiated with the taliban the same force that 18 years ago. afghanistan was the taliban from the country because they were harboring terrorism and they were hovering some of below them. you mentioned the tanks that the taliban there and of course those have been on and off and on and off but what do you make of the timing of this attack given that they've just resumed recently. the timing is just that they were they want to show the taliban wants to show the americans and. to the war that they're still in control of afghanistan at least half of afghanistan you know recently in the. yesterday or 2 days ago they published an article about the war in

afghanistan and they had messages from former secretaries of state ambassador and generals american generals and they were saying the didn't know afghanistan at all they didn't know the geopolitics of afghanistan and they didn't know what to do with afghanistan and with the taliban's dollar arms for the former secretary of state of under george w. bush was saying that he doesn't have any visibility of who he's enemies war he doesn't he didn't know how to treat with pakistan is pakistan. so that's that's why it's very complex to handle afghanistan and the americans they don't they don't know how to. handle the taliban in afghanistan and in other general was saying that the united states had poor in $143000000000.00 us dollars into afghanistan in order to rebuild afghanistan but they still haven't done much

and that amount of money was biggest that the plan the marshall plan when the americans invested in europe. what does this latest attack say about the level of security in afghanistan in general especially given that it's still ongoing. it means that there's still more security in afghanistan because as long as you don't want to you don't want to lead the taliban to control or afghanistan or be part of the of the government they still will be attacking every day and the what what the they were saying is like the american people the american government is doing what they were doing since the vietnam war they're disguising the truth the taliban keeps sending terrorists. to blow up american facilities in afghanistan and what the american government says it says because the taliban are weak that's why they keep sending terrorists. but the real truth is that the

taliban are the real forces unfortunately in afghanistan and you have to count on them in order to secure afghanistan lawyer and middle east expert thank you for your time and your comments. now against all of this an article has been published in the u.s. press detailing years of deliberate dissin from ation by top american officials who have been putting on a brave face despite knowing the truth about the afghan war. hundreds of thousands dead trillions of dollars lost generations traumatized but you know what nothing good comes easy nothing in afghanistan we helped liberate an oppressed people. and we will continue helping them secure their country rebuild their society and educate all their children boys and girls. all that i set to defeat al qaeda and deny it a chance to rebuild is within reach and we're doing

a tremendous job. and as you know a big part of the job is isis certainly the biggest and al qaeda and we. we've got them down very low numbers you didn't need to be nostradamus or clairvoyant to know that someone was telling bull it's just logical fallacy you can't keep fighting the same guys for 20 years and claim the jewel winning but then appearances must be kept up it's important that everyone thinks you're winning right up to the moment you admit you lost why well it's obvious no one has the remotest clue we were trying to do here we didn't have the focus notion of what we were undertaking there is a fundamental gap of understanding of the front end of the stated objectives grew lines in the military and the lack of understanding of the resources necessary and we'd never have known if it hadn't been thousands of secret and classified

documents on afghanistan stuff from the white house from the pentagon the un and the various n.g.o.s well we would have known it's pretty damn obvious that the war is going terribly but who says mouth and all that it is worth considering what the president the deficient said and what they actually believed when i called our troops in action i did so with complete confidence in their courage and skill and tonight. thanks to them. we are winning the war on terror. and. today we lack metrics to know if we are winning or losing the global war on terror are we capturing killing or deterring a dissuading more terrorists every day than them addresses on the radical clerics are recruiting training and deploying against us does the us need to fashion a broad integrated plan to stop the next generation of terrorists the us is putting

relatively little effort into a long range plan but we are putting a great deal of effort into trying to stop terrorists the cost benefit ratio is against us see when you're in your 2nd term and you started a really messy war that you just realized you can't hope to win there only so many ways to save your own but here's a list of words you should use courage democracy kids schools and hospitals and for the people that don't buy your baloney get a hope in there as well thanks to the courage of these military and civilian personnel a nation that was once a safe haven for al qaeda is now a young democracy where boys and girls are going to school new roads and hospitals are being built and people are looking to the future with new hope also poor in money into huge infrastructure projects to obligate money that was appropriated to so we could spend it through building infrastructure in ways that have again

instant could never sustain or even the use in some cases if you're a nato country taxpayer i honestly don't believe you can comprehend how much of your money was poured into this adventure you 1st need to understand the sheer degree of incompetence that these leaked documents show imagine for example someone's putting together a crew for a bank heist they invite a bunch of people give them a time and place and tell no one what their role is no plan so everyone shows up thinking that. everyone outs knows what to do and things go as you would expect now is the time to save your own heidi let's add a few more words difficult days human rights confidence success we will reward good governance work to reduce corruption and support the rights of all afghans men and women alike. there will be

difficult days ahead but i am absolutely confident we will succeed. you just cannot put those amounts of money into a very fragile state and society and not have if you corruption you just can't a legacy of mass corruption that's putting it lightly what else the juke specs the guys on the ground they sought disaster they reported it back to washington washington with its countless departments that now have the courage to stand up and say they screwed up so they put up appearances everyone was doing what made them look best rather than what worked best interesting enough many of the documents were published with the name lessons learned perhaps an effort to extract something anything of value from this unmitigated disaster but you know as it have got a star not long ago and after seeing what i saw there i can tell you all misty i

can guarantee you that while they may have learned their lessons they sure as heck are putting them to use. the french government is pushing ahead with its controversial pension reforms despite huge public hostility resulting in mass protests and strikes earlier today the prime minister formally presented his planned or got live now to paris and are to charlotte devinsky for the details. charlotte what are their plans for their pension reform. what we heard from edward felipe the french prime minister today about his plans for this new reform of the pension system one of the perhaps most controversial things that he said during that speech was that the pension age would rise from 62 years to 64 years that will though come into specific effect for those who are turning 18 in 2022 they will be the 1st individuals who will be integrated into this new fully

universal pension system which is taking france's 42 different pen. systems and putting them into one system he said that anybody who is born before $975.00 wouldn't be impacted or told by these changes and those who were born off to $975.00 and who were career at the moment they would see some 70 percent of their pension being calculated according to the only rules rather than the new ones that will come into force in 2025 he went on to say that the new system would guarantee somebody who'd worked a full career around a 1000 euros a month as an income when they retire and he said the big winners from this in a moment would be women saying that they would be compensated 100 percent for the time they take when they're all maternity and they don't receive points from having their 1st child rather than the child which is currently the system in place let's

take a listen to what edward phillips had to say. the pension reform bill will be ready at the end of the year we will present it to the council of ministers on january the 22nd and it will be discussed in the assembly in february. but of course any changes to france's pension system are likely to be controversial as you may be aware we are now on day 7 of a strike a strike that has power lies to transport network care in paris it's also had a massive impact on the national rail services across the country as well as plain services with many planes being grounded many people came out to the streets across france last week more than 800000 individuals to take part in the nation day of strikes then of course on tuesday we saw some 339000 people come out across the country we know that unions have already called for a new day of strike on thursday and again next tuesday in anger at any changes to

the pension systems many people telling us that they fear the new. system will mean that they will have to work for longer and that they would receive less money at the very end we saw last week those tensions spilling over into violent on the streets and it is unlikely that this in the details of specific details would fully going to quell the i would hook the disappearing post as a result of this ingestion of changing the pension systems are to charlotte even scathing q for that report. a russian delegation headed by foreign minister sergei lavrov visited washington d.c. on tuesday much of the irritation of the democrats there there was present though seemed happy about the visit just had a very good meeting with foreign minister sergey lavrov and representatives of russia discussed many items including trade iran north korea i know if treaty

nuclear arms control and election meddling look forward to continuing the dialogue in the near future. well grove also held talks with u.s. secretary of state mike pompei oh the issue of alleged election meddling was raised but the meeting wasn't all about us russian disagreement i think arsalan explains from the outset it became clear how much room for improvement there is in the relations between russia and the united states for instance one of the cases election meddling the secretary of state my campaign has been very adamant that any interference in america's relations is unacceptable by a foreign power to which russia's foreign minister sergey lavrov stressed that all such accusing still exist in the realm of speculation. now as remembering or not you suggested simply to read the report we did and there is no proof of any collusion so he also has repeatedly said that russia is ready to

release full transcripts as to what was said by the russians and by the members of the trump team by a special communication channel that had been established back in 2618 but the quoting to the russian foreign minister those attempts to make those transcripts see the light of day have so far been stopped by the trumpet ministration. after the integration of donald trump we suggested to our colleagues that in order to dispel all the basis suspicions let us publish this close channel of correspondence starting from october 26th until november 27th so that everything would become very clear to people unfortunately the current administration refused to do so now the bone of contention between russia and the united states is the i.m.f. or rather the absence of the deal now and both parties of both ministers have kind of clash this to how they see the moving forward for instance the russian foreign minister sergei lavrov has again said that the countries could use the start treaty

that had been signed back in 2010 but mike pump a has made it clear what the. knighted states don't like about that deal. agreement that was entered into many years ago when powers were very different on a relative basis around the globe. it was at a time that the weapon systems the threats were very different than they are today today so we believe not only do the conversations need to be broadened to include the chinese communist party it's year that the russian president spoke again about russia's preparedness right now to agree on its extension to leave the tensions in the global community given that the last instrument of arms control between the united states and russia will stop operating we are prepared to do that even today on the other hand circular has reiterated that russia has been making unilateral steps of good faith for instance the russian president had previously said that russia wasn't going to deploy any weapons that had been found under the i.n.f.

treaty in europe unless washington or its allies decide to do that 1st but it wasn't all negative there are some points where russia and the united states do see eye to eye on where they do see each other as valuable partners syria afghanistan north korea all those aspects all those political crises see russia and the united states working together and both countries and seeing did their best both ministers at least did their best to try and move that train forward as much as they could for us democrats that meeting between russia and america's top diplomats was one more reason to suspect secret links between trump and moscow. trump is meeting with russia's foreign minister in the oval office again i'm visser he's invited in i'm always locked out last time they laughed about trams firing of komi today they can celebrate the success of russian propaganda regen wouldn't recognize this g.o.p. trump lead rope and compare our meeting in bribe this afternoon what conspiracy are

they cooking up today congress or congress seems to have been captured by a desire to destroy us russian relations used to splurge and shoot adam schiff describes normal by literal contacts between countries in particular the reception of a foreign minister or one country by the president of another country as a triumph of russian diplomacy well he might as well throw doping accusations against russian diplomats following the case with the athletes and call for our criminal liability to me position is just absurd. but panic over trump russia ling's wasn't the only thing that got democrats excited on to say earlier democratic house leaders officially rolled out articles of impeachment against the president they claim he's ignored and even damage the interests of the country artist and picks up the story. now the meeting focused on nuclear nonproliferation as well as other international issues but it appears that negotiations and moving

forward on these vital international matters is being held back by some internal turmoil within the united states of america and it just so happens that this meeting is taking place on the very day that articles of impeachment have been drawn up against donald trump over a phone call he had with the ukrainian leader and allegations that he obstructed the congressional investigation into that phone call the 1st article for abuse of power it is an impeachable offense president should be engaged in an unprecedented categorical and indiscriminate defiance of the impeachment inquiry. this gives rise to the 2nd article of impeachment for obstruction of congress i think it's a disgrace if people could make it be true that if the thing that was a perfect conversation they were perfect cover say here is the thing. and i think it's great this is somewhat of a pattern whenever a high level meeting takes place but it seems that it's followed by

a harsh attacks on the president and accusations of some kind of inappropriate relationship between trump and russia or cia director john brennan was among the 1st to float the t. word treason officials and pundits even begin speculating whether russia had something on trump that would cause him to so publicly side with you have been watching perhaps one of the most disgraceful performances by an american president donald trump's action just today were quote appalling and shameful shocking and sad damaging and a threat to american democracy those harsh words related mainly to the investigation conducted by bob muller regarding allegations of collusion now interestingly a new report has just been released regarding how that investigation was carried out the new report seems to indicate that the f.b.i. made great errors and how they what about investigating donald trump during this this probe into alleged collusion donald trump spoke critically of the f.b.i.

and pointed toward the report the report actually and especially when you look into it and the details of the report are far worse than anything i would have even imagine this was an overthrow of a government this was an attempt to overthrow the report shows is that the democrats are not even the democrats but any government official that did not want donald trump that wanted to support hillary clinton but that does not want donald trump in office or donald trump as president united states will do anything including lie lie to congress lightest senate questions feed stories to the media break protocol violations of confidential investigations in order to feed those. stories to the media to create certain narratives to harm trump the report effects the impeachment process in general and hopefully you know most americans probably are going to read every single word but i hope that they do it's far more damaging than some of the outlets have made it sound there are lots of facts in there remember the report the i.g. report was never supposed to 5 indict anybody or bring criminal charges it was

supposed to show that there was wrongdoing and how these investigations started in the 1st place how the russia trump lie started in the 1st place. the u.n. says it's found nothing to link iran to the september drone attacks which targeted 2 or oil plants in saudi arabia the facilities belong to a saudi aramco a company run by the saudi government the one that is still investigating the case at this time it is unable to independently cooperate the cruise missiles and unmanned aerial vehicles used in these attacks were reigning in origin after the attack washington and its allies were quick to point the finger at iran imposing sanctions on the country which included iran's subtle bank called the measures the highest ever imposed on any country over iran denied any involvement and shortly after yemen's who the rebels claimed responsibility but that did not seem to convince the u.s. or its allies. the did not originate from yemen the attack was launched from the

move and was unquestioned be sponsored by you wrong we know precisely who conducted these attacks was iran i didn't hear anybody in the region who doubted there were a single mom there is no evidence that the attacks came from yemen. emerging information indicates that responsibility lies with iran we need to deter iran from its milan behavior. live not a writer and commentator bar one for more on this now the un has so far failed to find any evidence of iran's involvement does that undermine the credibility of those who pointed the finger of blame at them. i believe this is scandalous actually united states and european governments who jump to the conclusion that it was behind that attack on. you know over there finally in saudi arabia so when the united nations expect actually who examined their graves. there are

only spies and also. signifies and confirmed that there is no link between iran and these kind of myths and also to say that they didn't know that it in yemen where behind is that back i believe most people will pose no sanction in iran should actually apologize and revise that decision to actually and then by go again. do you think there's any chance of that actually happening the u.s. coming out and apologizing. no i don't believe that united states will. they can come out and say i was without a story he has a united nation which is a very. organized vision a despicable one the experts who actually did their job and the way saying got nothing to do with it and. you know behind the origin of this kind of overblown

i don't think united states will average i we never had them apologizing for these kinds of. solutions or sanctions against other countries as it is and caution is that i think we all believe that a free free was we lift people in democracy so when when they make mistakes big mistakes like this. losers i think they should apologize and they should actually say sorry we we made a mistake. their position clearly kind of attack it was actually originated. from yemen i many people believe it is actually these kind of mistakes where manufactured and yemen itself and the same thing apply. i believe to the program lives on that saudi differences will could not actually deal with these rules all deal with this missile despite having the very expensive but listen i was

supposed to protect their. stack it's. one writer and commentator for a time in your comments. that's up our wrap up of the day's top news for now thanks for tuning in. join me every thursday on the alex salmond show and i'll be speaking to guest of the world of politics spoke this unless i'm showbusiness i'll see that. facebook and google started with a great idea and great ideals unfortunately there was also a very dark so. they are constructing

a profile of you and that profile is real it's detailed and it never goes away turns out that google is manipulating your opinions from the very 1st character that you type into the search bar it will always favor one dog food over another one comparative shopping service over another and one candidate over another they can suppress certain types of results diced on what they think you should be see if they have this kind of power then democracy is an illusion the free and fair election besan exist for the more growth we give them the sooner we are all pain the. same wrong. will just don't hold. any new world that is yet to shape out these days to come to educate and gain from an equal to trail.

when something find themselves worlds apart. she's to look for common ground. this is boom bust broadcasting around the world and covering all aspects of our global economy in the 21st century i'm been one number one job or in washington here's what we have straight ahead. this is more than a triumph for organized labor it's a triumph for workers everywhere across america but the real question is the new you is will the new u.s.m.c. actually be a better deal than nafta we're going to break it down in a way that you.