. 15 deployments to afghanistan. and the rangers are key in our counterterrorism mission in afghanistan going forward. you're exactly right about the abrams charter and in fact in working with president ghani, we have worked closely on how to leverage the excellence that we have seen in the afghan security forces, after began special forces and leverage that for the good of the rest of the army. so one of the hallmarks of the four-year road map which we are working together on is to increase the size of the afghan special forces. these these unit -- because these units have proven so effective on the battlefield. we can't produce these units overnight, as you well know, ma'am, it takes years to grow a special operations soldier, a ranger a commando. so we are embarked upon a plan where they are recruiting more commandos now and we are expanding those units one company at a time so that in the four years we have gained by the warsaw summit, we will almost double the number of special forces units. when we couple that

nelson: in afghanistan. gen. nicholson: the taliban are the medium for many of these other terrorist groups to operate. because of the convergence of these groups. your logic is absolutely sound, sir. sen. nelson: does that include isis? gen. nicholson: we don't see the same level of cooperation between the taliban and isis. they are in conflict with one another. but the taliban is not achieving the key effects in reducing isis. that's coming from the united states and the afghan counterterrorism effort. in response to senator graham, you said, when we leave -- restate what you said. we can leave, in your opinion, we can leave a stable afghanistan? gen. nicholson: i think brecon station -- reconciliation would be the goal between the belligerents and afghanistan. this is what the government want s -- a reconciliation with the belligerents. earlier this year there was a reconciliation. 20,000 of them are returning to afghanistan to be reintegrated into society. if this goes well, hopefully this would be a catalyst

and in afghanistan. another aspect of it, that i think is -- to answer your question, if i may, the reconciliation is the thing that we sort of kept out there, you know, in case it catches. and, of course, it has to be out there, you always want to have that dialogue open, you want to have that -- the ability to do that. and the afghan government has been open minded. my approach to it, however, looks at it again from return on investment. we spent a lot of money on it. we put a lot of stock in some of these activities. and both in time, bandwidth and money. and it just hasn't yielded anything. so the idea of continuing down that path with zero chance of it materializing, again, i'll keep it open, i would recommend that they would, but, again, i don't put that much emphasis on it. the last thing i would say is all roads don't go through islamabad. so when you're looking at peace negotiations, the idea that somehow you don't have them in a neutral place, whether it is switzerland or wherever, you know, an

nicholson: the destruction of al qaeda in afghanistan, the destruction of the islamic state in afghanistan, helping the afghans to extend the control over the population to at least 80% going forward. working closely with the pakistanis to reduce sanctuary for the taliban inside pakistan. working with the afghans and international community for an afghan-led peace and reconciliation process. if we can get these elements into our plan going forward, we can bring the site to a successful conclusion that enables us to continue our ct efforts and a prosperous and stable afghanistan. sen. perdue: thank you for your professionalism and leadership. i hope to see you over there soon. >> thank you chairman, thank you general, thank your family, and most importantly, told the women that -- tell the men and women that you lead how much we appreciate their service. i will be a broken record and get to contracting. we have made progress. i will acknowledge we have made progress. there are still problems i think we have to talk about. about $100ing billion to contractors in afghanistan in the last eight

will be doing in afghanistan. what will we do that has not been done in 15 years, given this damaging report? gen. nicholson: thank you senator. i appreciate the chance to talk about this plan for the way i had. -- the way ahead. i acknowledge and express our support from this body to sustain our effort. our number one objective has been to protect the homeland. we have not had another an attack from afghanistan in 15 years we have been there. that is point number one. i eight village fully the significant -- i iconology fully the significant cost. we are at 10% of what we once were in terms of troop commitment and have reduced other expenditures significantly. yes, problems persist. i do not want to minimize those. with president connie, we have a ghani, we president have a partner that is ready to go after these problems. the example of ghost soldiers. this is something he was willing to do that we were not previously willing to do. i wanted to share the planes we are sharing with the afghan yearnment, the four

in afghanistan. look forward to your comments. >> thank you, peter, good to see you again. glad to have this opportunity to join you to talk about afghanistan, where it is and where we are going and what we expect from the new leadership here. i want to begin by addressing something that is at the forefront of everyone's mind, the testimony before congress, last week by general john nicholson. the big take away from his comments is militarily speaking afghan forces are in a stalemate with the enemy. i want to say something about the national security forces. the high level that we are taking is not a sign of weakness. it is evidence of their resolve to win the fight against terrorism not just for afghanistan but for the world and also a sign of the increase in the number of terrorist groups operating in our region and the advanced capabilities they have. we are encouraged that the new administration is focusing on strategic goals rather than troop numbers alone and taking into account military needs

afghanistan.military and policy experts discussing conflict between afghan forces and the taliban. they also made recommendations for how the us should engage in afghanistan in the future. this is 90 minutes. [inaudible conversations] [inaudible] >> we are delighted that you could join us today for a rollout of the new report that we have done on afghanistan and forward. as we were thinking about the presidential transition we thought it was important to put together some papers for the next president before we knew who the president would be. really recommended what would protect and vent american interest in any number of topics. it scenes that afghanistan is a war that continues 16 years on that this is a critical area where a new administration would have to grapple with us strategy, objectives and a way forward for the campaign. so we commissioned a senior fellow here to lead the development of the report. he is not president and ceo of strategic leadership group. he is also a former military

that i keep me bringing this back towards afghanistan, we also need to reassess our approach to afghanistan and it -- how it relates to pakistan. i was hoping that we would address it also, but we're not good friends to people. that's part of our 12-step process of recovery is to say we have a problem. and the problem is we're not very good friends when we're actually not supporting our, you know, the people that we committed ourselves to supporting. and sometimes you have to actually pick your friends and your enemies. and if somebody is behaving as a friend, you treat them as a friend. if somebody is behaving as an enemy, you treat them like an enemy. we have to look at that, and quite frankly in afghanistan i use the example of we were signatories in the national unity government, you know, and i heard people, senators talk about certain issues to -- with general nicholson, i wish they would be asking the ambassador that would be there, but he wasn't, but they're asking about some things, almost putting the blame on the afghan government. we have not honored our signatory commitment to t

in afghanistan. he's also doing his ph.d. at king's college on the afghan civil war. he's a retired air force colonel in special operations who works for crystal who was the commander in afghanistan. so over to, ambassador. and we look forward to your comments. mr. mohib: thank you, peter and ioanni. glad to see you again. i'm glad to have the opportunity to talk about afghanistan and where it is and where we're going. and what we expect from the new leadership here in washington. i want to begin by addressing something that i think is at the forefront of everyone's mind that has been following afghanistan and that is the testimony before congress last week by my good friend general nicholson. the big takeaway from his comments was that militarily speaking afghan and allied forces are in quote unquote stalemate with the enemy. i want to say something here about the national security forces -- the afghan security forces. the high level of all soldiers that we're taking is not a sign of weakness. it is

in afghanistan.for too long our strategy inafghanistan has been lose . meanwhile, the risk to american afghan forces has only grown worse as the charge threat has intensified. the caliban has grown more legal and it is territorial control and inflicted heavy casualties onafghan forces. in october, the taliban lost multiple concurrent offenses , seriously threatened for provincial capitals, while afghan forces for the us support successfully defended those capitals. the taliban seized the initiative, kept the pressure on afghan forces and captured new ground. in afghanistan as we have seen elsewhere around the world, as america has pulled back, vacuums have opened up and be in and filled by more of our enemies. al qaeda and the hook on a network continued to threaten our interest in afghanistan and beyond. isis is trying to carveout another safe haven from which it can plan and execute attacks. randall is reportedly arming and funding the taliban. as if the situation were not complicated enough, russi

have the afghanistan state affiliate that is in afghanistan. fractiousn internally movement so they are not a monolith. they have many different factions, although there's different factions are very loyal to the taliban identity. an aspiration to maybe fragment the television and get them to defect, that continues to be unlikely. in andment the taliban get them to defect is unlikely. everyone has a veto, sort of like the un security council so as long as there are people among their inner circle that believe the military campaign not to continue, since that is the status quo that is probably what it is going to produce. there is a huge status quo bias within that organization and it will take some time and very different conditions than what they face now before they make a significant change in strategy. with respect to the afghan government, sadly under the karzai administration they plutocracy which has damaged their legitimacy and a variety of areas. that does not mean all government officials are like that. i know a lot of government offi

to afghanistan. option b, an open ended commitment. we keep 8400 troops there and current levels of funding and do it forever. essentially as jim cunningham put it, put the current approach on auto pilot. and that includes managing the policy episodically from the white house and from washington, d.c. and option three is what we called focused engagement. is there a way to -- is there a way to do something different besides open ended commitment or simply leave? and so this is what we called focused engagement. a very simple and realistic strategy. and it is based on a fact that a negotiated outcome is probably the most realistic way to gain a favorable and durable result in this war. so we have got to make the -- we have got to figure out how to make the conflict right for negotiations, in which the afghan government has the advantage. and then you need to be building the foundations of a peace process, and not a peace deal, where people get around the table and try to hammer out a deal in three day

isn't there a war in afghanistan? that's a question. i think there's no war in serbia, that's clear. it's clear they have to be brought back because we cannot take everybody who wants just to come here. but if we ask the eastern european refugees to go back, that's one thing. for me, to deport afghans, that's another thing. you say, ok, they are safe places, i doubt that those who go back and there have been people who have been brought back who are part of a religious minority, i doubt that they have a possibility to develop themselves. and i think we should at least accept all those who come really from countries like iraq, like afghanistan, like syria, like eritrea where you have no safety and our asylum laws say that. they don't ask for everybody that he has to show he has been personally an individually pursued. >> i think you're wrong. the geneva convention actually states that as a refugee you have to prove that you've been persecuted. and for instance, someone who comes, for instance, someone who comes from morocco and says i'm

i've got many friends in afghanistan. i've got people who lost their lives there and i want to see the country succeed. >> one, it's really hard to win in afghanistan. it's not so hard to lose. i think mr. trump needs to keep that in mind. he's not noticeably a person who likes to lose. second, the price you pay for losing can be very high. we tend to forget sometimes that we have krit scriticisms about strategy but one person for going to afghanistan was to prevent future attacks on the homeland. the result is not just a product of afghanistan but law enforcement, intelligence. but we have not had another attack in 16 years. flirt with that at your peril. and then i would say, we're slow learners. churchill's famous comment, you can trust the americans to make the right decision after they've tried everything else. and we may have reached that point. we've tried a lot of other things but we have learned. and there's some really critical points here that you can profit from what we have learned and you have to be willing

i would be interested in hearing your assessment on afghanistan. i cannot believe president trump you get better understanding on the extent to which russia is helping me telegram? are you wouldn't -- is helping the taliban and? -- sec. mattis: on the situation in afghanistan, my point in talking to president donnie and the field commanders is to gain their political and military appreciation to the situation. we are putting our thoughts together now. the president has been rightly reticent on it because he is waiting for my assessment on it and the us has been from the intelligence community and he is opening to my advice on it. but first i have to formulate where i stand. this is the normal collection of information and to assess what the other countries are doing in the region to help or hinder our efforts in afghanistan. shortly i will have my thoughts collected. [indiscernible] sec. mattis: no but it should not take too long. i have to integrate a fair number of issues in order to give a good recommendation for the way ahead. but thank you. >>

the indiana congressman is a former state senator and navy in ran who served afghanistan. he represents indiana's third congressional district. >> congressman jim banks, republican of indiana representing the third district 37 years old. when and why did you decide to run for office? >> well, this is a remarkable opportunity to serve during an historic moment in american history. i have served for six years in the indiana state senate. a couple of years before that i served in local government as well. i've always felt called to serve in different capacities. i also serve currently as a reserve officer in the united states navy. but a couple of years ago, two years ago from today i was deployed to afghanistan as a navy reserve officer. i was there for over six months then deployed for over eight months total away from my family. when i returned home, late that spring, the incumbent member in my district had announced he was running for higher office and immediately became a candidate because i believe at this moment we need leaders to step up and solve problems, and wanted

>> i served on the nato headquarters base in kabul, afghanistan. along with a number of, dozens of other nato troops from nato countries on the headquarters base at the time. now called resolute support headquarters. i was there during a historic moment as the longest war in american history ended, operation enduring freedom transitioned to operation freedom's sentinel was there during the transition from one phase of the war to the current phase we're in today. >> what did you see when you were there and how will you apply that to what you're doing here? >> i hope to serve in a capacity here where i can be a new leader on national security issues. what i saw there was an effort that was taking steps backwards instead of forwards. since i have been home, for over a year and a half, we have seen the taliban capture parts of afghanistan that they haven't held since 9/11, a war that's been going on for 14, 15 years that we have seen regress to a point that has made afghanistan less safe and ultimately i believe the world less safe. i want to be part o

>> afghanistan has always been a challenging environment. we do a lot about reach with all different groups including very much also the with the government to obtain the necessary security guarantees operate in this country but this is a fragmented conflict landscape. you have hundreds of different groups changing and shifting alliances. we are therefore operating in what is one of the most challenging security environments. if you look at the statistics, afghanistan is one of the countries that is the most dangerous for aid workers. it's not the first time they have been victim to a security incident. what happened this morning is by far the worst incident that we have had in a long time in the organizations. >> our condolences go out to those affected. dominick, director of operations , joining us from geneva. thank you very much. >> thank you very much. >> a russian court has found the country's most prominent opposition figure guilty of investment. -- of investment -- of embezzlement. the charges against him he says are politically moti

let's start with the story about afghanistan on the telegraph.ps to prevent afghan meltdown, europe faces a new refugee exodus if britain pulls out of the war—torn country warns michael fallon. how is this meltdown occurring? only a short time ago everyone was saying we could save people out our troops. most people have probably forgotten entirely that there are still 500 british troops in afghanistan on a training facility. it has been quiet since the end of combat operations. the defence secretary is issuing this warning. he is only saying it will be wrong for britain to pull out. he does not seem to be talking about increasing the number of troops over there, but the story refers to a senior us commander in afghanistan saying thousands more soldiers would be needed to break the stalemate against the taliban. you wonder whether this speech by the defence secretary is some sort of softening exercise to prepare britain for the possibility that more troops would have to go back into afghanistan 16 years after it all started. it would surprise and

but here in afghanistan nobody cares. i really regret coming back. reporter: obaid originally fled afghanistan with his brother. they paid traffickers 8,000 euros. he now earns around 10 euros a day. but he says the worst thing about coming back is the almost daily terror attacks. his brother stayed in europe. obaid returned because he couldn't leave his beloved sister alone any longer. when he was in germany he only learned a few words of german on the streets. he was never offered a language class although he lived near frankfurt for a year. he says he wanted to integrate, but couldn't. still, leaving was hard. >> at the airport i started crying, and the police asked me if i really wanted to return to afghanistan. i said yes. i have to. >> i was really happy that both my brothers had made it to germany. but i was sad, too. i felt very lonely, and cried a lot. i thought i'd never see my brothers again. reporter: for many returnees, the most vivid memories of germany involve bureaucracy. mokhtar fazil also fled to europe via turkey and the balkan rou

and then in kuwait and iraq and afghanistan. in iraq, i initially, up in mosul, i hadn't realized how extraordinary saudi was. one of the one-stars got him. i had a local translator. he didn't translate from ara bilk to english but telling me about the individuals and the culture and explaining to me -- i had a reasonable idea of what islam was and the difference between sunni and shia. but we have christians, kurds, shia and sunni and different political parties, different movements, different districts, tribal elements, and he was an incredible window into iraqi society for the first year that i was there and again very, very privileged to have him. tragically, the situation up there deteriorated, as you'll recall, the year after we left and so forth. and ultimately, he did have to come to the united states. we got him here and now i see him out every time i'm out in los angeles or new york, because he is a manager of several different banks. he is at that level, regional bank manager and doing exceedingly well as is the rest

foreign policy with leaders of afghanistan. plus, iran, once again defies america and really the world firing another missile just days after being officially put on notice by the trump administration. how should the u.s. respond? ♪ why do so many businesses rely on the u.s. postal service? because when they ship with us, their business becomes our business. ♪ that's why we make more e-commerce deliveries to homes than anyone else in the country. ♪ here, there, everywhere. united states postal service priority : you >> jon: now a fox news alert. we hear that a special forces officer today has been wounded. a news conference is being held on the deteriorating situation in afghanistan. we are told that caliban is as dangerous as ever. >> john, 12 u.s. troops have been killed in afghanistan since october. at the top u.s. commander, general john nicholson is facing tough questions right now who want to know when the war in afghanistan will end, why the u.s. is not winning, and what the u.s. people have gotten after 15 years of war.

from today years ago i was deployed to afghanistan as a navy reserve officer. was there for over six months and deployed for over eight months. when i returned home, late that spring, the incumbent member of in my district announced he was running for higher office and i immediately became a candidate. i wanted to be one of those leaders to constructively move our country forward. >> where were you in afghanistan? >> i served on the nato headquarters base in kabul, along with a number of other nato troops on the headquarters base. now it is resolute support headquarters. it was during a historic moment as the longest war in american history. .peration-enduring freedom it was there during the transition from one phase of the .ar into the current phase >> what did you see when you were there? how will you apply that to what you are doing here? >> i hope to conserve and a capacity where i can be a new leader on national security issues could what i saw there was an effort that was taking steps backwards instead of forward. since i have been home, we have seen the

in addition, in afghanistan, the backlog is in the thousands. anywhere from 7,000 to 10,000 depending on what month the state department is reporting. there's only a current allocation of 1,500 visas to cover that backlog and we are still accepting new applications. every visa we get out, we receive a new one in its place. if we don't get these people here, they're going to die. we feel the congress ought to restart the program in iraq, remove the cap and say, service, you qualify through your service and can pass the most extreme form of vetting which we ask anyone to pass, which is what this entails, they ought to earn the visa they have been promised because of their service. finally what we believe is that they ought to be called veterans. we do not have to give them v.a. benefits but shouldn't we give them an honorary designation as veterans. this is not a bridge too far. in world war ii, the quarter million filipinos who fought with our forces in the south pacific were declared honorary veterans. we gave them v.a. benefits and built a v.a.

i am going for afghanistan, to put the flag of afghanistan beside the other flags. >> they've succeeded in that. this winter, they'll race in the alpine world ski championships, as the first ever ski team to represent their country, the first step toward the 2018 winter olympics. michelle: our reporter told me that they are homesick, but at least they're living in one of the most beautiful parts of europe. that's all for this week. if you'd like to share your thoughts on any of today's stories, send me a tweet or visit our facebook page, dw stories. in the meantime, goodbye from me and the whole team. - [voiceover] up next it's music city roots live from the factory. in this episode two long sets, one acoustic, and one electric from the legendary doobie brothers. just ahead after this. - [voiceover] national broadcast of music city roots is made possible by acceptance auto insurance based in nashville, tennessee. acceptance offers personal automobile coverage from coast to coast. more information available at acceptance.com. you, your terms accepted. - [voiceover] franklin, tennessee, i

we know more about sicily today than we know about iraq or afghanistan. if you want to confirm a refugee, i think when you call us a refugee we are not refugees. >> i'm not comparing. likely notost veterans. we served in the united states army and marine corps. we served under different circumstances. sometimes we were allowed to carry a weapon. to be a veteran is better than to be a refugee. we don't ask for any privileges. we did, we didn't ask for any privileges. we just asked that our country would be strong enough. we didn't ask for any privileges from the americans. only that we build our new country. i would tell a story on this. , are you working for the americans? i said, yes. ofould get the last version the code and maybe they would or me work with halliburton the u.s. army corps of engineers. yourld me, don't expand allegiance. they let us down in 1991. i told him, no, don't be so mean. 2003 is not 1991. in america and waving to my uncle from washington. he told me that as the americans at 711 -- friends towant our be here as soon as possible.

we know more about sicily today than we know about iraq or afghanistan. if you want to confirm a refugee, i think when you call us a refugee we are not refugees. >> i'm not comparing. likely notost veterans. we served in the united states army and marine corps. we served under different circumstances. sometimes we were allowed to carry a weapon. to be a veteran is better than to be a refugee. we don't ask for any privileges. we did, we didn't ask for any privileges. we just asked that our country would be strong enough. we didn't ask for any privileges from the americans. only that we build our new country. i would tell a story on this. , are you working for the americans? i said, yes. ofould get the last version the code and maybe they would or me work with halliburton the u.s. army corps of engineers. yourld me, don't expand allegiance. they let us down in 1991. i told him, no, don't be so mean. 2003 is not 1991. in america and waving to my uncle from washington. he told me that as the americans at 711 -- friends towant our be here as soon as possible.

and likely, in afghanistan, we have wild pistachio. we have hoards of pistachio, so trying to see how we can become a main exporter. we have a project with uc davis, washington state, texas a&m together, that they are working with extension programs in afghanistan. their extension officers are working out with the ministry. so they will be the key partner of us to let them know how we can adopt some of those technology. at the same time, we'll be sending some of our students, our government employee, to learn and work in these research stations. our researcher will come here to learn the new technology -- at the same time, to see how we can adopt it to the context of afghanistan, where we are suffering from the lack of electricity, other issues. >> i think so many people have an image of afghanistan as a violent place where the only thing that's grown are poppies and the drug trade. >> people are engaged -- they have a life out there. they go to school, our girls going to school. our kids are going to school. we have hospitals, we -- a

in addition, in afghanistan, the backlog is in the thousands.anywhere from 7,000 to 10,000 depending on what month the state department is reporting. there's only a current allocation of 1,500 visas to cover that backlog and we are still accepting new applications. every visa we get out, we receive a new one in its place. if we don't get these people here, they're going to die. we feel the congress ought to restart the program in iraq, remove the cap and say, service, you qualify through your service and can pass the most extreme form of vetting which we ask anyone to pass, which is what this entails, they ought to earn the visa they have been promised because of their service. finally what we believe is that they ought to be called veterans. we don't have to give them v.a. benefits. but shouldn't we add least give them an honorary designation as veterans? this is not a bridge too far. in world war ii, the quarter million filipinos who fought with our forces in the south pacific were declared honorary veterans. we gave them v.a. benefits and bui

>> at least a dozen and in my time in iraq and afghanistan. many, many times, translators, usually muslim, risk their lives and in some cases saved e from harm. general petraeus: when you got hit, did your translator survive? kim: when we were with a fourth infantry patrol and when we were hit by an al qaeda car bomb, it killed the captain and his iraqi translator who was serving as a translator for us all. they were closest to the blast as well as my camera crew and four of the soldiers were injured. they are always next to the people taking the most risk and helping us understand the culture. in your case, you can conduct military policy. in my case i can understand what is happening in front of me and report it back to everybody here. but can i ask you a question? beast" er of "the daily and i was with cbs news in baghdad from 2003 to 2006 and hit by a car bomb there and translators were our lifeline in everything we did. my question is, a lot of americans haven't met a muslim, a muslim who served with the military overseas. there is a lot

i am going for afghanistan, to put the flag of afghanistan beside the other flags. >> they've succeeded in that. this winter, they'll race in the alpine world ski championships, as the first ever ski team to represent their country, the first step toward the 2018 winter olympics. michelle: our reporter told me that they are homesick, but at least they're living in one of the most beautiful parts of europe. that's all for this week. if you'd like to share your thoughts on any of today's stories, send me a tweet or visit our facebook page, dw stories. in the meantime, goodbye from me and the whole team.

forces in afghanistan. view policyave to toward pakistan. it underave done president bush or president obama has not produced the result that we want. host: how often do you read donald trump's tweets? time: i read them every there is a news item related to them. ofm not a regular follower the tweets. host: is that good or bad for foreign policy? guest: i think it's mixed. the intent of the president is clearly communicated through tweets. it gets a lot of attention. it affects the new cycle. challenging to describe, such a, comment on in small number of words. it's both positive and negative. host: that's why you are a diplomat. good morning. caller: good morning. yourvery nice to have guest. let me be specific. i don't have a lot of faith in the u.n. getting a lot done with regards to iran. if the u.n. cannot stop iran from launching their icbm test launches and the sanctions don't stop them, i know what my answer would be. i don't want to fight a war with them after they get a nuclear or head. -- warhead. realistic has to be in the expect

. >> caller: we have a war going in afghanistan. we have one in iraq. we're trying to get into syria. korea has not been settled, and now y'all are trying to start a war are russia, lindsey graham and john mccain. good day.rtainl >> guest: well the caller is certainly entitled to this point of view. that is the great thing about c-span. i would disagree and, i would stress that, for the entire 25 or so years period of since the end of the cold war, since the breakup of the soviet union, success of u.s. administrationss have tried to build ae productive, sustainable relationship of russia, and, russian actions in ukraine, really have put an end toto 25-year trend. the vision of, that was guiding our policy and the policy of our european allies, europe at peace with itself and it is neighbors, envisioned russia as the one of the pillars of european security. so the annexation of crimea was the critical moment that that- point. >> host: let me take the caller's statement one step fourth. go back to your essay with regard to nato. what is happening with som

i am going for afghanistan, to put the flag of afghanistan beside the other flags. >> they've succeeded in that. this winter, they'll race in the alpine world ski championships, as the first ever ski team to represent their country, the first step toward the 2018 winter olympics. michelle: our reporter told me that they are homesick, but at least they're living in one of the most beautiful parts of europe. that's all for this week. if you'd like to share your thoughts on any of today's stories, send me a tweet or visit our facebook page, dw stories. in the meantime, goodbye from me and the whole team. steves: in a nutshell, classical rome lasted about 1,000 years -- roughly 500 b.c. to 500 a.d. rome grew for 500 years, peaked for 200 years, and fell for 300 years. the first half was the republic, ruled by elected senators. the last half was the empire, ruled by unelected emperors. in its glory days, the word "rome" meant not just the city, but what romans considered the entire civilized world. everyone was either roman or barbarian. people who spoke latin or greek were considered civili

afghanistan. the obama administration decided to increase the development aid in afghanistan from 1.2 billion dollars to $1.4 billion. -- $4.1 billion. they undertook a civilian surge which took 500 civilians in afghanistan up to 1300. they set about trying to implement a smart power approach in afghanistan. unfortunately, the results did not live up to the billing. some of you here saw this firsthand. for one thing, we saw the state department, u.s. aid they cannot get experienced people to go to this country. you had to bring in contractors and temporary employees. the vast majority of those people never got out into the countryside because it was dangerous there and the civilian unions did not feel they were obliged to go there. we then did not have oversight where huge amounts of cash were going and they often ended up in the hands of the enemy or corrupt officials. you were actually exacerbating conflict rather than alleviating it. you also had a problem -- if you wanted to do an aid project,

and afghanistan. this is about an hour and a half. >> welcome, everyone. i am told this is the largest turnout we have had for a gathering in our new building since we moved in here. that is lovely. we have to thank who thought up that executive order, so we are grateful for that. [laughter] >> but believe it or not, this is not a spur of the moment in planning. we have actually been talking about doing this event -- in two weeks, it will be the one year anniversary, actually. general petraeus is a very busy man and not easy to get him on our schedule and we managed to do it. our timing could not have been better. and we thank you for taking the time to be with us. of course, when i say the timing couldn't be better, the goal is not to critique the executive order, but i think it makes it -- the discussion today important in two ways. our main topic is about the fate of the interpreters left behind in afghan and iraq. and the special immigrant visa program that was supposed to take care of them. the p

in 2011 congressman mulvaney voted for the immediate from afghanistan.in 2011, and he voted for the immediate withdrawal of all us troops in afghanistan. congressman mulvaney voted to abandon america's mission to prevent afghanistan from becoming a safe haven from terrorists to attack the homeland as they did on september 11th is disturbing enough. and the confirmation hearing, did so at the urging of a single constituent with no regard to the national security consequences meet with serious doubts on matters of national security. beyond matters of defense and national security i am concerned about congressman mulvaney's support for reckless budget strategies that led to a government shutdown that made attempt to diminish the impact by referring to it as government slow down, more orwellian term temporary lapse in appropriations. the views and record are representative of the dysfunction that plagued washington the last 7 years and that attitudes. over 30 years in the senate i have shown great deference to presidents of both parties selecting members of

let's move to afghanistan. >> certainly. harris: and the possibility we're learning from the military that we might look at putting more forces on the ground there. what does that look like and why? >> well, i know that general or secretary of defense mattis received some suggestions from general nicholson, the commander on the ground in afghanistan, that he needs a few more thousand troops to break the stale may. the problem right now is with the u.s. withdrawal we're down to 9800 soldiers left in afghanistan, and it's put an immense strain on a fighting force of afghan security that is not well prepared. harris: extra dangerous for them too, probably. >> it is, in the sense the taliban have had a resurgence over the last couple of years, and predominantly, my biggest concern is they've managed to retake 50 to 60%. harris: they are like scorpions, theyiest and you can't bridge them. >> they are focused scorpions. hellmund, the birth place of the taliban, the home of the opium, and the revenue of the opium has gone up 43% in

and then in kuwait and iraq and afghanistan. in iraq i initially when we were up in mosul, i hadn't realized how extraordinary saudi was. so one of the one-stars got him. i had a local translator. bashar, phenomenal. he didn't translate from arabic to english but telling me about the individuals with whom we were going to meet. he was explaining about the culture. he was explaining to me -- i had a reasonable idea of what islam was and the difference between sunni and shiia. , in mosuls we had yazidis christians, kurds, shiia and sunni and different political parties, different movements, different districts, tribal elements, and he was an incredible window into iraqi society for the first year that i was there and again very, very privileged to have him. tragically, the situation up there deteriorated, as you'll recall, the year after we left and so forth. and ultimately, he did have to come to the united states. we got him here and now i see him out every time i'm out in los angeles or when he's in new york because he's now a