for the assad regime. i think it's possible at times the assad regime will manipulate those to cause trouble for the opposition. i think it's clear that the assad regime is using as propaganda the existence of small groups to discredit the opposition. that's something we should all push back against because it isn't true. i do thinking that we shouldn't also overstate the connection between the assad regime and jihadi organizations. though elements certainly tolerated and enables jihadi groups on the way to iraq. we have documentary evidence of that. very clear evidence of that. those groups, there is no love lost there. the assad regime, i would argue, as much as there were jihadis traveling via syria to iraq. we also have good testimony from captur captureds is hia militants they were flown to damascus for training by hezbollah. the regime was playing both sides. that's what they do. look out for number one. and so this is not a regime in bed with the jihadis. they will try to cause trouble for the oppos

the assad regime won't participate in its own demise. yet we backed the plan. that was february, right after the russians and chinese vetoed the security council resolution. this heralded the start of the massacres really. there were massacres all throughout. this is when it started to pick up. anyone following the developments of the time knew the ananne plan wasn't going to work. we didn't have and we still don't have a plan b. right? we hear a lot about plan b. back in february after the mass killings started, the administration actually leaked that it was planning a plan b. on february 28, 2012, the cnn's crack pentagon correspondent barbara starr got a scoop from a senior u.s. official and said the pept gone had detailed plans for military action against a regime. or had it? you have to consider the remarkable statement. i encourage you to look for it. i will quote from it right now. the remarkable june 7 statement from chairman of the joint chiefs of staff martin dempsey. general dempsey was asked to, quote/unquote, give us some idea about how a big milit

the many difficulties that are posed by this unrelenting, brutal crackdown carried out by the assad regime and their military loyalists will have far-reaching consequences for the region and beyond. let me just make three quick points. first, we continue to support kofi annan's efforts and we do so because he represents both the united nations and the arab league and to have the joint special envoy who is speaking to two organizations that have seen their common interests in trying to bring an end to the violence and help to precipitate and then shepherd through a political transition and the six-point plan that former secretary-general annan laid out is a good plan and of course, it's not being implemented and of course, the contempt and the rejection of the first principle of that plan, namely the cessation of violence by the assad regime has certainly been a grave assault, not only on the lives of the syrian people, but on the international effort intended to bring an end to this ongoing conflict. kofi annan is now trying to put together a group of countries that would include russia th

the assad regime was playing both sides during the war. that is what regime is due. they look out for number one. this is not a regime that is in bed with the jihadist by any means. they will try to create trouble for their opposition. at the end of the day, in my judgment, there is an independent jihadist movement, certainly the divide your jihadist community believes in and is supporting that group. they feel is one of their own. i am not in a great position to make that decision independently. but the regional work of the jihadists is in a better position and they have made that judgment. though the existence of that growth helps assad politically and operationally, i think what it does is help him keep control of the dominant military because it scares those folks. it does not have to be a dominant group. it can be a small group. but it sres those folks. it allows assad to say, if you'd effect on me, those are the people you have to deal with. -- if you defect on me, those are the people you have to deal with. >> if you like to ask questions, make yourself known

it would be morally far more satisfying to do something dramatic that would topple the assad regime tomorrow. starving the regime might prove the more effective strategy. for more on this, you can read my column in this week's "time magazine" and on time.com. let's get started. >>> my guest glen hubbard is the senior economic advisor to governor romney. in that role he is the chief architect of governor romney's economic plan that will convince you either the governor is going to fix america's economic problems or not. he also has a day job. he is a dean of the columbia university of business school. welcome. >> thank you. >> let's get right into it. governor romney has an ad in which he says the first thing he is going to do is a big tax cut. now, you have talked a lot about the debt and deficit. he has talked a lot about the debt and deficit. how can it possibly make sense if you're worried about debt and deficit that the first act you would have would be a massive tax cut, which will surely explode the deficit? >> well, not really the case, fareed. first of all, what governor romney said

they have a longstanding grievance against assad regime, father and son, going back over 30 years. from that moment on, some elements of the muslim brothers went underground taking arms, and launching a terrorist campaign against the syrian regime and the late 1970's, culminating the seizure of hana, which they took great loss of life. after that, the muslim brotherhood were banned. punishment was death. in addition to the muslim brothers there were many strands of them inside and outside syria and large numbers of armed islamists extremists, jihadists, fighters coming from neighboring countries. from afghanistan, pakistan, tunisia these people, many coming from iraq where they have been carried out suicide operations. gross acts of terror are committed. this is the problem, the no. 2 man in a al qaeda al-libi, released video accusing bashar al-assad. does the u.s. wanted the on the side of al qaeda? >> let's bring rafif jouejati into this. the description patrick seale has of the opposition of which you are a part critics let me correct him on a couple of things. first of all, i wa

the assad regime can't whole territory.while it's a positive development it may spur mass defection, it will also be ungoverned space which al qaeda likes. as result some wmd, some of the chemical weapons, 40 or so that the mdc sites in syria that contain gas, vx and mustard gas may start to go somewhere else. we don't know. these are weaponize, a very large advanced and nasty program. they also have production of facilities and hamas. the third trend that we're seeing, ethnic cleansing. there are two purposes why the assad regime is doing this. one is they are clearing sunni villages and allied areas. unlike washington, the assad regime does have a plan become and that land is to create -- they are going back and clearing out areas in places like elsewhere to make sure that there are no hospitals in the air. the second reason they're doing it is that massacres on the scale they're doing days, hastens civil war, and they want a civil war because if it's an insurgency, they can pick sides. but a civil war, hey, we don't want

security council at the moments will not spend any intervention or condemnation of the assad regime g. to china and russia's veto so i think turkey is increasingly being seen as an important strategic player in order to try and place of the put the pressure on to assad's and to try and intensify the conflict in various ways now they have said at this stage they're not going to invoke article five of the nato treaty but certainly you know even the denial of the fact that they're not going to do that at this stage again is putting pressure on assad and i think that does have the unfortunate consequences of intensifying the civil war and the battle inside syria it means that the plan becomes much harder it's much harder to get you know to sit around the table with the rebels when there is increasing international pressure for him to step down and not actually engage in dialogue and debate instead do you think nato will eventually go around the united nations security council as it has in the past and started a conflict in the name of humanitarian intervention in syria. well i would say t

the danger is when you start to broaden it out and try and talk in broad brushstrokes about the assad regime in general that could really intensify and internationalize the conflict in a very dangerous way we're in what do you think about that it looks like you know assad is set on a very strong messages that he will protect the sovereignty of his country if you respect if you like the regime in damascus or not. right i think this is a message to the united states and to the west in general but it is very good at amplifying the fears of outside countries about what's going on inside of his country a good example of that would be in two thousand and six we now know that the assad regime helped instigate the riots in reaction to the publication of the infamous prophet muhammad cartoons and we know that from files released by wiki leaks and also because of the available evidence and part of the reason that they did that was assad could say look you have to deal with me because the alternative is much worse this is what you get if you push democracy in my country and so i think that what you're

assad and syria. it would be a blow to the regime in assad goes down. >> it is run by a minority in syria.ny ethnic group is dominant but they may turn out to be radicals like hamas in gaza. >> i think that would be a lesser evil than the relationship assad has had with the iranians. i don't think you will get a reversion to the status quo. the iranians will have no longer have the primary client there. hezbollah will be put on its back foot as well and you have a lot of other regional interests there. the saudis, turkey. there is a reason russia isn't going to get on board because they are supplying with the iranians supplying helicopters and money to the assad regime. >> people say it is not as easy as libya because the opposition doesn't control any territory. harder to carve out a safe haven for them. the syrian military is more capable and in this case maybe russia will get in our way and say we are not going to let you do it and intervene on the seed of syria? >> several years ago i stumbled into an encampment of elite syrian republican guard troops. these were hungry looking troops

getting rid of the assad regime puts iranians on the back foot in region at a moment when iran may bereshold. >> you heard marco rubio say the problem is one of the doubts is, we don't know who is in the opposition, what it is made up of. he didn't say this, others say allied with perhaps, islamists extremists. how do we know that the opposition will be better than assad? >> first of all it is hard to get worse he's compiled more than a 10 year record of atrocity. recently in the "wall street journal" we had an op-ed which did surveys of opposition leaders. and found few are sympathetic or minority are sympathyish to muslim -- muslim brotherhood, amount of them admire the united states this happens every time we are going to support opposition in libya, bosnia, kosovo going back many years always the allegations with al-qaeda sympathizers and so on most of the time they are proamerican and grateful for our help and we have a chance to gain an ally as opposed to letting the situation continue to bleed. >> i'm going to drive a point about iran. i would say this is an iran proxy war this

reports that children are being used by the assad regime as human shields. this is very, very outrageous, what the russians are doing. we're not going to be left with a choice if the russians continue to fuel the assad regime with helicopters and arms to murder its people that we have to get greater involvement in it. so the russians should back off now because they are escalating this conflict tremendously. >> you have been very close with the romney campaign. you're on the list, everybody says, to be considered for vice president. do you agree with romney, foreign policy advisor john bolton who wrote that we should basically tell the russians in no uncertain terms they can forget about any kind of sustained good relations with the united states as long as it continues to back assad. he continued to say we should resume full scale indeed accelerated effort to construct the limited missile defense system designed by george w. bush, announce our withdrawal from the s.t.a.r.t. treaty, that moscow and beijing think about that for awhile. it does sound if you fo

at what point will the wider world take action against the assad regime? bbc news, on the jordan-syrian border. >> accusing the government troops inside syria of torturing children and using them as human shields. for more on this allegations -- these allegations, we are joined from new york. this is a very strong allegation. what exactly are you accusing the syrian government of? >> let me say that the report that came out was a general report, the annual report from the secretary-general of children in our conference, where we monitor children, and one of them was syria, and recently, we sent a technical team down to the refugee camp as well as in those neighboring countries to do some interviews and to take testimonies from people who had been affected by the conflict, and we found some horrendous testimony, and i witnessing of torture. basically, children had been killed and maimed. like and other conflicts, because of bombardment, but what we find to really quite appalling in the situation is that children have been tortured in detention, and as you k

the obama administration says russia is sending attack helicopters to the assad regime, which could escalate the violence of further. and the un and now calls this a civil war. our diplomatic correspondent starts our coverage tonight. >> relentless bombardment today, but it has been documented by u.n. observers and journalists traveling with them. on the road north, they witnessed more damage coming not just from government tanks, but helicopter gunships. just one snapshot of destruction in a country that according to the head of un peacekeeping could now be considered civil war. other officials are more cautious, but all agree this to -- the situation is deteriorating. >> the point is not what we call it, it is that we are incredibly concerned about the willing and the liberal excl -- escalation by the government in the last four or five days and the increased level of planning and coordination of military operations of the opposition. >> it is not just president assad's forces behind the increased violence. a syrian army vehicle being blown up, apparently by rebels. government tanks on fir

-- the assad regime.they do not want to overthrow it because it is a brutal dictatorship. they want to overthrow it because the people are apostate and fundamentally deserve death, right? i am unconvinced from historical precedents that they will control all geovany elements. it makes the situation a lot morris. this is very, very difficult. and i think we have got to recognize that fact. the situation is worse than the situation in syria. the situation in libya i think got blown out of proportion. there were not a lot of jihadi elements. for years, it had been crushed. they tolerated some of those elements because they were useful to funnel people in over the last several years. these are not good people. but there is a reality on the ground where i think that threat there is much more dangerous over the long run. for those reasons but also because of the proximity of a neighbor. there is an active al qaeda element that is still quite capable. it does things when it feels like it in baghdad. so a couple

the assad regime was playing both sides during the war. that is what regime is due. they look out for number one. this is not a regime that is in bed with the jihadist by any means. they will try to create trouble for their opposition. at the end of the day, in my judgment, there is an independent jihadist movement, certainly the divide your jihadist community believes in and is supporting that group. they feel is one of their own. i am not in a great position to make that decision independently. but the regional work of the jihadists is in a better position and they have made that judgment. though the existence of that growth helps assad politically and operationally, i think what it does is help him keep control of the dominant military because it scares those folks. it does not have to be a dominant group. it can be a small group. but it scares those folks. it allows assad to say, if you defect on me, those are the people you have to deal with. even if they are not everybody. that is what is dangerous about this. >> if you like to ask questions, make yourself know

uprising broke out say in the syria sectarian violence between supporters and opponents of the assad regime is flared up repeatedly in neighboring lebanon no more of the ripples the syrian war sending out in artie's debate show cross talk after this quick break. sigrid laboratory to look kirby was able to build the world's most sophisticated robot which will unfortunately doesn't give a darn about anything tombs mission to teach creation why it should care about humans and we're going to this is why you should care only on the dog com. you can. still. go in and welcome across talking to people about syria goes so does lebanon with a violent crisis in syria continuing to deepen and spread can lebanon remain on the sidelines much longer and many other questions abound is syria intentionally destabilizing lebanon and are there elements in lebanon being used to force regime change in damascus. to cross-talk the wave of violence across lebanon i'm joined by robert fisk in beirut he is the middle east correspondent for the independent in pittsburgh we have typhoon goal he is a member of the answe

working for the assad regime. i do think it's possible that time the assad regime will manipulate those elements to try to create trouble for the opposition, and i sort of thing the assad regime is using its propaganda the existence of the small groups to try to discredit the entire opposition and that's something we should all push back is because it simply isn't true. but i do think that we shouldn't also overstate the connection between the assad regime and jihadi organization. though elements of the regime certainly tolerated and enabled jihadi groups on the way to iraq, and with documentary evidence of that. you know, very clear documentary evidence of that. those groups, there's no love lost there, and the assad regime, i would argue, you know, as much as they were jihadi's traveling via syria into iraq, and we have those records can we also have very good testimony from captioned shiite militants also declassified, that iraqi shia fighters were traveling to tehran, being flaunted. flaunted-- being trained.

i think it is bashar al assad and his regime and he is intentionally trying to spill over the conflict in syria into lebanon in order to scare the international community and to deter the international community from contributing to the toppling of his regime i agree with robert that it is lebanese fighting lebanese but these are proxy lebanese and so you do have those who are allies to the syrian regime who are doing the fighting against those who are for the syrian revolution so again i think the hands behind the conflict in lebanon and the spillover in lebanon is the bashar assad regime all right gentlemen before we continue let's have a look at some of the background to the story. hereon tensions between supporters and opponents of the syrian government we've knighted street fighting in the lebanese city of tripoli and sound today it least fifteen people were killed and thirty wounded as activists reported fresh shelling in central syria where a message last week left more than one hundred people dead so there were a long. war especially tripoli rounding area a lot of people warned

the assad regime think it cheapens what they're doing. they argue they are essentially trying to secure the country and that they're fighting terrorists. the rebels don't like the word civil war because they think it pits two equal sides against each other. they say they are essentially outmanned and they're not an equal against the assad regime because they're fighting a dictator. but the u.n. is declaring it a civil war. and u.n. peacekeepers have been attacked in syria in the past 24 hours. they were trying to get to the site to check on a possible attack there. u.n. peacekeepers were attacked. they had rocks thrown at them and they were turned away. all of this has created an atmosphere where more weapons are entering into syria. the u.n. is being attacked. there are real fears, the eyes and ears, the u.n. who have only access to the country they may not be able to bring information out of syria and attacks and mass curse will only continue and get worse. jenna. jenna: regardless of the word choice, there is something happening inside

action against syria it's all about claims the gulf state has already put militants fighting the assad regime but its payroll israel's news agency thought to have close links with israeli intelligence says saudi troops are moving

hezbollah getting weapons didn't spot those weapons which are apparently going to be used against the assad regime however you can take conspiracy theories rather too far in lebanon and believe everything that everybody tells you so you will end up by believing absolutely nothing ok there there's no

regime change. but the majority of syrians are not against assad but if they see the pictures of the regime down the president fleeing the rebels taking over the presidential palace it will demoralize people and even assad supporters will stop resisting and give up and this is how t.v. works people believe it even before they think whether it could be true or not. in any other arab spring country leave yeah even leaves that qatar based channel al jazeera broadcast pictures from tripoli central green square showing rebels celebrate in the regime's fall days before they actually enter the city and move he claims help the rebels to advance after we can could office followers in syria the journalist warns things may go much further therefore as a form they will not only use their own channels to send this message they will replace syrian satellite channels with their own with the same logos and same design while such concerns may be dismissed as paranoia officials in damascus are taking any threat to syria's information service seriously this decision is a political decision that violates international

it's going to produce a backlash by the enemy at that point, the assad regime. the enemy get as vote. the enemy will perceive that as an effort to overthrow the regime and at that point perhaps options become on the table that we don't want to think about. you know, attacks against western troops in the region. hezbollah attack. last time we intervened in this part of the world, a lot of marines died. those kinds of things are real possibilities. so the enemy get as vote. that leads to an outcome which is really military intervention to push assad out. i think in my mind at least that's what's on the table. there are real negative repercussions for all of this. right? there are some costs. the benefits, i think, are known. the costs are of the situation -- i think there is a growing jihadi group in syria. the most major at least announced group is one called jaba del nuzra. they have typical propaganda outlets. it's not a strong group that can compete with major opposition groups. jihadi organizations are not viable competitors for political power in most places

government that continues to provide heavy weapons and moral support to assad and refuses to authorize u.s. sanctions on the regime and even blames assad's recent slaughter on the opposition and foreign powers. the more basic problem with this approach is that the administration is has already tried it and moscow rejected and shut down the u.n. security council. what has changed to make things different now? what the president does not seem to realize is what bill clinton came to understand in bosnia. despite the strong russia's reputation in the arab world, the russian government has a a withssad for 15 months. what makes us think that president putin will change course whenassad is still the dominant power on the ground? we're approaching a major point decision. plant has been a failure for months. the head of the u.n. monitoring mission in syria has suspended its operations for security reasons. use ofs increasing helicopter gunships calls for a no-fly zone and russia is on likely to ever supported policy of regime change in syria. the administration's approach is being overtaken by events. furthermore, the opp

so, my perception is assad is still in power. and the regime has very important international support to follow with the repression. >> thank you for joining us from damascus. here in germany, britain's prime minister david cameron has been+ in berlin pushing for more action to end the eurozone debt crisis. >> cameron has not always been very welcome by the eurozone. britain after all is not a member of the single currency. >> but today, britain agreed on one thing. the members of the eurozone will have to push ahead. >> chancellor merkel be feeling the heat. the pressure on the euro and the eurozone economy shows no signs of letting up. david cameron lent his voice to calls for action. meanwhile, the election of francois hollande has deprived merkel of a key ally in her drive for austerity. on thursday, she appeared to agree with cameron that year was already made up of two camps. >> i think those countries which have a common currency must intensify their cooperation, just as we're doing with the physical contact. just as we will have to do i

made a huge story out of it that the russia is supplying assad's regime with weaponry but it's as i said not the first time we were just heard another story that some media reported that military exercise involving iran syria china will be held somewhere in syria in the next couple of weeks these reports were also turned into a mask you syria by the media saying that russia is playing a dangerous game in the syrian backyard but this also has already been denounced by the russian defense ministry which said that no such games are possible in a conflict zone which syria so much in the is at the moment so this is definitely an all out information was not something we are completely not. we just have to wait and see what's there stories and what all this insatiable that was the media produced as i've said russia has been denying any involvement in supplying the assad regime with weaponry and firmly stands on its position that it's not so you know decides and that it's not doing anything wrong from the international board to view those are two correspondent alexy. well signs that an internati

we've chosen to air it as part of the growing evidence that the opposition to the bashar al assad regimeraq-style insurgency, pushing syria closer to all-out civil war. here's cnn's arwa damon. >> reporter: hardly audible below the swelling jihadi chorus, a voice says, "this is a suicide bombing mission against assad soldiers." "god is great," the voice declared, as a voice comes into view, apparently approaching the checkpoint. a camera zooms in. outgunned by assad's forces, some rebels have turned to suicide bombs and roadside ieds. iraq-style guerilla warfare. in this video obtained exclusively by cnn, the brigade commander shows how the bombs are made. cylinders are packed with a lethal concoction of explosives, fertilizer, and other chemicals bought locally. mahmoud says his men are moderate islamists, fighting for democracy. we want a democratically elected president and a military that is separate from the presidency, he says. he says they're getting no outside help. [ speaking foreign language ] we're relying mostly on mines and making bombs now, the captain explains. this is how

international community's caution over the violence, they failed to call for any action against the assad regime. he said that his country is at war and must direct all efforts to winning that. our correspondent spend time with the rebel forces in the north. here is his report. >> night time, just over the border. and the army rains shells on to the towns and the village's. and under the blood red sky. russian-made helicopters take to the sky, firing on rebel fighters. this is where some of the artillery landed. as far as we know, no one was staying here except six boys who were sleeping when the shells hit. and so, another father mourns and the innocent suffer the most. one of mohammad's sons is dead. the others are injured. the family and says they cannot take them for treatment, are afraid they will be arrested, if they do. the rebels say this is why they fight. in the deadly cycle of bloodshed, the casualty's will only grow. this 8-year-old struggles to tell his story. the syrian army did this to me, he says. the rebels vowed revenge as they plan to take an army checkpoint. this is by far th