guest tonight, incredible timing -- we did not plan it -- general and former commander of centcom, anthony zinnihe has a book, "before the first shots are fired." that's his new book. i only can say, too late! >> the pentagon said airstrikes against i.s.i.s. and syria had begun. >> we have been waiting for weeks and here it is tonight. >> jon: ooh, it's so anticipated! it was the iphone 6 of wars! (laughter) it's expensive, a little bigger... a little more unwieldy than you thought it was going to be. (laughter) it's going to be at least a two-year commitment. (applause) kind of feels like you just (bleep) the last one. (laughter) but at least it's not the watch. so how did the new product launch go? >> they attacked i.s.i.s. targets four locations in syria, headquarters, buildings, storage facility, finance center, supply trucks, army vehicles and training compounds. >> jon: i.s.i.s. has a finance center? i.s.i.s. has been in existence for, like, a month... they have a finance center? no, no, that is for bombings and mass killings. you want small business loans, that's down the hall. so we hit

though that might not be an economic interest it's a moral interest in my view. >> general anthony zinnior yours service and for being here. >> thank you. i need to get in a break. when i come back, some startling predictions of very smart guy who says all of the conventional wisdom about the midterm elections is dead wrong. princeton professor sam wang is standing by live. so what we're looking for is a way to "plus" our accounting firm's mobile plan. and "minus" our expenses. perfect timing. we're offering our best-ever pricing on mobile plans for business. run the numbers on that. well, unlimited talk and text, and ten gigs of data for the five of you would be... one-seventy-five a month. good calculating kyle. good job kyle. you just made partner. our best-ever pricing on mobile share value plans for business. now with a $100 bill credit for every business line you add. lactaid® is 100% real milk? right. real milk. but it won't cause me discomfort. exactly, because it's milk without the lactose. and it tastes? it's real milk! come on, would i lie about this? [ female announcer ] lact

general anthony zinni and he led u.s. forces in the middle east and former u.s. envoy, as well. important for the president, general zinni, tonight, to be precise in laying out the strategy and not leaving it sort of wishy washy some. >> i think it's critically important. he will have three audiences tonight and one is the american people and one is the allies and potential coalition partners and the third is isis. i think he's got to make a very strong statement about what we're going to do and how far we're going to take this. he also has on make the case strong enough that our allies are will willing to sign on to whatever strategy that the secretary kerry and others in the region are explaining about the potential allies and the american people want to know where we're going on this and how much it will take for us to get this done. >> and the fourth audience is the u.s. military. they want clarity from the commander in chief, and i believe, correct me if i'm wrong, they also want an exit strategy. they want to know what is the mission. how do you achieve that mission and how

. >> that is general anthony zinni advocating for more war in the middle east.d you call the networks, lee fong, to get their response to why they are not identifying these pundits or former generals as contractors for the contractors? out and they did not respond, the networks or the pundits. if they do, we will update the piece. general said, he is a board member to bae systems. earlier this month, bank of america released a research note systems,g that bae which is the stock that slumped through the year, is expected to rebound because of the conflict in iraq and syria and the region . this entire military strategy, the military escalation, certainly benefits companies like zinni's firm. the correlation between the number of people advocating for war, or should i say the lack of antiwar response in the media, with the polls that show overwhelmingly of are for striking islamic state? of course, military opinion is not monolithic, but on many of these networks, you hear from a limited set of opinions. for fox news, if you watch their prime time coverage, which

. >> joining us in new york is general anthony zinni. special envoy to the middle east who retired as a four star general. co-author of the book before the first shots are fired. how america can win on and off the battlefield. general great to have you with us. >> pleasure to be here. >> put more thought into before we use force around the world, we haven't had sound analysis and move too quickly. what's happening in iraq and syria are we moving too slowly? >> i do believe we are moving too slowly. time and space is working against you. the time now is we have seen the beheadings and some of the atrocities, near genocide taking place, the gaining of ground. my big concern is i.s.i.s. may get into baghdad, i don't think they can take bafgd but they can certainly -- baghdad but they can certainly infiltrate and cause chaos, need to push them back quickly, iraqi military build back up and restructure in a way that's more positive. and give space for the new iraqi government which has to demonstrate they're more inclusive than last one becau

. >> joining us to discuss all of this, general anthony zinni, former commander-in-chief of u.s. central command, as well as the author of "before the first shots are fired: how america can win or lose off the battlefield." general, it's great to have you here and critical to have you here on this very important day. you had in recent days, kind of joined the criticism that the president had been too slow, too cautious in his approach to isis. what do you think, with that in mind, what does the president need to say tonight? >> well, i think it has to be a decisive strategy that he puts forward. the first piece of this is getting isis out of iraq. that's critical. they've been in there for months, they've committed near genoci genocide, atrocities they've committed. the first thing you want to hear is how do we get them out and back into syria. and how we engage them in syria. so they have no sanctuary. but that's just the military part of the plan. there's still issues there. obviously the ground forces are going to be made up of peshmerga, iraqi military, possibly syrian opposi