it protects the national airspace of our baltic allies 24/7, 365. the german air force contingent is flying the baltic air policing mission in estonia as we speak reported conducting more than 30 scrambles between the end of august and the beginning of november this year. they intercepted russian aircraft that were flying near civilian air routes with their transponders turned off. october finland back in just after, within days, of the russian aircrafts committing two violations. this is one of many such instances the finish have seen. and our own united states airforce has witnessed similar conduct. among the most notable was back in april when a russian fighter made an aggressive and unsafe intercept of an airship reconnaissance plane over the baltic sea. to me, if you add up these different incidents, this suggests that presence, joint training, and political resolve are extremely important. this is a point in time where there is a great deal of push and push and test and has going on. indeed, that is precisely what the european reassurance init

they want to have continual presence through the baltic air policing which they have. the united states participates though other countries participate as well. as i mentioned germany as the nation right now. it rotates. they certainly want to see that ongoing. and what closer cooperation in a number of other areas as well. >> do you believe any sort of more muscular response is required to do with russian provocative action in airspace violations and all of that, or with that risk as witches said potential escalating the conflict unnecessarily? >> these sorts of questions are asked literally daily. people are making highest level of government the judgment calls on a daily basis. based on everything i know, it's about right for now. but again tomorrow something could happen. this could change. i can assure you these matters are monitored at the highest level of government daily. >> you mentioned your communications with european and nato allies. following the november 8 election, have you had to reach out to those allies and sort of reassure them based on present elec

we want our baltic friends to know we stand with you.russia to know that american congress will stand by with our allies and putin and russia's aggression towards democracies, including ours you will pay a big price. here is what i predict. there will be a bypartisan vote next year sanction russia for trying to interfere in our elections and rec r elections all over the world including the baltics. eric: quickly, senator mccain, the same? >> the same and a permanent u.s. presence. that doesn't mean a permanent basing but it means a permanent rotation of american troops into the baltic countries so they can be assured we are committed to their independence and freedom. very frankly we're hearing that from them, that they want a permanent american presence so they can train, arm, equip and work closely. these are wonderful little countries, my friend, and they're brave and courageous and they're independent but they're under enormous pressure and they need an american presence and american support. we need to give them that message and i c

as you know, the baltic nations, sweden for example is reinforcing islands in the baltic that they withdrew ago. it is doing extraordinary things. real sensitivities in the baltic states as well so how do you see the relations between putin and the west, particularly nato? relations between putin and the west will be terrible because nato is not only closing to the borders, it is actually increasing military presence right on the border and anyone who knows the real situation in europe would laugh at the assumption that russia is planning to attack the baltics or poland or anybody else in europe. hadn‘t russian generals thought aloud about the possibility of, i'm quoting here, a limited nuclear award in europe not to be unthinkable? when nato is moving troops to the russian border, of course there will be noises made about nuclear weapons and so 011. but the point of the matter is that the west has crossed the line in ukraine. this was going to... the west has crossed the line? of course it does! russia has annexed crimea! excuse me, it has encouraged a coup, basically, in kiev. and suddenl

well, i think if thatis the baltic states.s the intention of the tweet, andi that is the intention of the tweet, and i think that would be reading too much into it at this point, you know, that is a radically different concept than either the united states or russia have had regarding the role of nuclear weapons. i mean, these weapons are only there to deter nuclear use. these are not usable weapons. they are vitally different from conventional arms. if donald trump intends to hold back proliferation, the spread of nuclear weapons, building up the us nuclear capacity is not going to do any good. it will make the situation worse. in order to deal with north korea, he has got to engage kim jong—unin korea, he has got to engage kim jong—un ina korea, he has got to engage kim jong—un in a dialogue to freeze north korea's nuclear and missile testing, which is helping north korea to improve its nuclear capacity, which is still relatively small compared with its neighbours. he needs to avoid ripping up the nuclear deal with iran whic

the most visible of these efforts is the baltic air policing mission. since they became members of nato in 2004, 16 nato nations have participated in this mission which protects the national airspace of our baltic allies 247, 365. the german air force contingent in estonia, as we speak reported conducting more than 30 scrambles between the end of august in the beginning of november this year, intercepting russian aircraft that were flying near civilian air routes with their transponders transponders turned off. i was in finland in october just after days of russian aircraft committing to violations, one of such they have seen in recent months. indeed, our own united states air force has also witnessed similar conduct. among the most notable was back in april when a russian fighter made an aggressive and on safe intercepts of an air force reconnaissance plane during a routine flight in airspace over the baltic sea. to me, if you add up all of these different incidents, all of this suggests that joint training and political resolve are extremely important

presence, particularly in the baltic states, poland, romania, bulgaria. but there's a question about the timelines, the perspective in terms of our, how long u.s. forces need to be present in those places. how do you think about the planning assumptions for our presence on the eastern flank, if you will? and the funding that supports them? as i understand it, it's really in the -- the operations budget. shouldn't this be something that, over time, is put into the base budget to recognize the fact that it isn't a one-year deployment, that we're likely to be there for -- for quite a while? >> so yes, it should go into the base budget. all of this, or most of this, should go into the base budget. but of course, the folks who are here living in washington know that the oco budget doesn't count for purposes of counting money that we spend in the federal government. so how crazy is that? it's kind of an accounting situation. but if we can live sequestration, if we can clean up some of these accounting situations that we have backed into the last however many ye

from the baltic to the adriatic an iron curtain has descended along the continent. warsaw, berlin, prague, i haven abaaoud pest, buk rest and sofia. all these famous cities and the populations around them line the sphere and all are subject in one form not only to soviet influence but to a very high and increasing measure of control from moscow. everybody talks about how great that speech was, how famous it was but what nobody mentions, it was a massive disaster at the time. churchill also wrapped in there a lot of please for special american/british relationship to save the british empire. it was met with protests, winnie, winnie, go away. united nations is here to stay away. don't be a ninny for imperialist -- >> they said it was -- accused the british leader of being unable to free his thinking from the roll of the drums and flutter of the flag of empire. he makes this iron curtain speech which actually truman helps craft as a trial balloon for his anti-communist initiatives and after the speech, he says we've got to back off from this. the american public is not

in other words, for instance, would they allow, say, eastern europe and the baltics to be pulled into the russian sphere of influence which is something vladimir putin wants. >> that would be something -- >> that's what they should ask about. >> it's part of those countries, the baltics in particular, part of nato. >> what do you think, mary? some doubts by republicans about his ties to russia. >> i think the larger question about tillerson is can you separate what is the business interest of exxon from larger american enterists. by that i mean it's not the same thing to run a company as it is to run the country's foreign policy. has he thought about america's role in the world? has he thought about grand strategy? what does he think about what china is doing in the south china sea, the iran nuclear deal? would he cooperate with putin in syria? there are a lot of hard questions to ask of him. >> the russia ties are obviously an issue. so is his history as a fossil fuel executive. oil and gas, the biggest fossil fuel company in the world, a very successful one. democrats are questionin

if we leave that aside for a moment, why would russia, putin, want to take over the baltic countries, those little countries, estonia, latvia and lithuania? putin can barely pay pensions in russia. is he going to pay the pensions in those countries? this is preposterous. what putin does not want, and no russian president would want this, are nato military bases on russia's borders. keep in mind, please, because it's never reported here, that nato, having built up in the baltics, the countries you mentioned, can hit st. petersbu petersburg, russia's second city, with ordinary artillery. not with missiles or bombers, but ordinary artillery. now imagine that there were chinese or russian bases in mexico or canada with that capability. would we be hysterical? absolutely. the problem we have here is there's all sorts of allegations being made in this country, along with the kind of neomccarthyism, who labels anyone who disagrees with the consens consensus, and labeled trump this, too, a puppet of putin about, a, what the russians did or didn't do during our election, and, b, what putin's g

is speeding up deployment of troops to poland and the baltic states and romania. they have already started to move out and poland and the baltic nations are concerned about russian operations. and poland's defense minister is welcoming the early deployment. >>> still to come on "action news" at noon, a cholesterol drug may have another hidden benefit. we'll tell you about it in health check. >>> and a mom stirs up controversy by using an unconventional method to sleep train her baby. >>> drivers in pennsylvania will pay even more taxes at the pump starting on new years day. an increase of 8 cents per gallon takes place on january 1st. the next increase is the third and final to be implemented by a state law passed in 2013. and the revenue is meant to pay for transportation projects. >>> a drug used to lower cholesterol could lowering the chance of alzheimer's as well. refitchers found that people were 10% less to be diagnosed with alzheimer's if they were exposed to higher levels of statins. >>> with the approaching cold weather people are making sure they have ge

the baltic states were very weak. small, easy to take. stalin made all sorts of historical reasons as to why the baltic states had to be soviet. which were spurious, not true. he could not get away with that argument. like a little finland. plucky little finland, it is a little-known fact about that during the war. question: this was the first the suggestionrd that our involvement in the far east, particularly in vietnam, arose out of the effort to maintain france. in so, would you say a little more about that? fascinating. conrad: no, again, the french were very reluctant to rearm germany and so we had to offer them all kinds of incentives. ancourse, de gaulle interesting relationship, you know? the french said, we're kind of with you but we are not. militarydraw the commissions for nato. they are in and out. it is a rough relationship. in order to get them to sign up for germany we have to commit to more support for them. we sent massive logistics to indochina. a lot of support. another great story if we had more time to talk about how

she has just come off a boat from across the baltic. she's a group from other woman who had been saved. she writes to her sister in paris. "my sister, i know nothing about you since we saw each other in paris. do you have any news of jack?" the nickname she had for her husband, sumner, or pete, the name she used for her son philip. "if my handwriting seems to tremble, it is because i have open wounds on three fingers and no eyeglasses. --lso have both the titus titus and my ears run. i can't hear on one side. my feet are swollen, and i have terrible dysentery. but after all that, my morale is good." she's 57 years old. "it is a miracle i am not dead. and to think i will see you soon. no time for more. kisses. your sister." so toquette jackson survived, but she didn't know if her husband and her son, who had been deported to the third reich, if they had survived. this is philip in the summer of 1945. he did survive, but he did not know that his mother had lived. i'm going to read you one more short section from here. philip found himself

previously, we didn't have any issues in terms of energy supplies to the baltic states. everything has been running smoothly. our european partners always tell us we need to come together, we need to move closer to find common ground, while exactly the opposite is happening here. they've disrupted our relationship in a sensitive area as to energy. certainly, we will resolve this issue. ensure energy independence. you might have heard we plan to supply liquefied natural gas. we plan to build a power plant. we might use small-scale nuclear plants. this is one of the key areas to develop in. we need to have some kind of an energy resources to drive the economy. road construction, infrastructure -- certainly, there are a lot of issues. there are others pending. the most important thing we need to provide is the use of the opportunities which is really close to our union partners. it is to be economically aligned to the economy in terms of preferences that the region has. so you have a free trade zone and preferences. instead of those, you have it from the federal government.

i did have an opportunity as i mentioned in my opening remarks to visit the baltic states. and those who are directly on the border as you would expect feel the most vulnerable. so i believe, i'll just repeat what they told me. they certainly do these actions as a major deterrence. and also as i mentioned, as a general proposition car allies would like to see more presence, more interoperable equipment, more training, more exercises. this was a general theme throughout all of my visit. >> do you think there's a risk of escalating tensions clutch he said the united states is not seeking a conflict with russia, but is there a risk of escalating the tensions that could potentially be to conflict by placing additional assets in eastern europe and the baltic states including some of these things that are associated with edi or just generally speaking with the desire to bolster the u.s. military presence in that area? >> of course managing risk is something that policymakers and military professionals do day in and day out. so there's risks in all that we do, but i would submit t

while russia expanded its sphere of influence, eastern ukraine, syria and attempted to bully the baltic countries. it defies belief that somehow republicans in the senate are reluctant to either review russian tactics or ignore them. so last, let me say that i have the highest confidence in the intelligence committee and especially in the intelligence agencies. the cia is faced with selfless patriots who anonymously risk their lives for the american people. excuse me. can i have some water? let me just say, in wrapping up the congress -- and then i'll open it up for your questions, i think by any objective standard, the 114th congress looks good compared to the previous one. everything from the nda bills, first long-time highway bill. florida, water resources bill, permanent tax relief, we address the opioid bill and a complete rewrite and transportation authority and many others. so even though there were obviously pretty big differences in a time of divided government, i think we were able to search for the things that it was my desire to search for the things that we had some agreeme

they decided they were going to sink any ship that was a float on the baltic. that's exec we what we did. we killed over 12,000 people -- and that's exactly what we did. we killed over 12,000 people and .ank every ship in the baltic philip managed to somehow miraculously survived her and he was one of 200 people of over 2000. but his father was drowned. he was liberated by the british. --the summer of 19 for five in 1945, he was hard because he spoke fluent german and english and french. finally, he discovered that his mother had survived and she wrote to him and said where are you? please come back to paris. september 1945as when he got on a metro in paris. l'etoile.t out at mother was there to greet him at the door at number 11. he said, i had gone back into my bedroom which i had left a year and a half before and it was the same. my mother hadn't moved anything. he was 17 years old. he had been deported when he was 16. but he told me, for me, everything had changed weird i spent a year in a concentration camp. my father has been killed. i missed my entire ad

i talk to a group of baltic leaders today. they want to know if they can depend on the united states of america or do i have this to accommodate? these countries were part of the soviet empire and then part of the soviet union for 70 years -- 350 years. so what we need -- and i think -- and i believe that the people around president-elect trump have that kind of inner strength. it's not just mattis who is our hero, but if he takes petraeus or mitt romney or john bolton, john bolton would shake up the state department in a way that issing on lover due, my dear friends. so general kelly, there's nobody that knows more about our own hemisphere than general kelly. and there's a scourge, called manufactured mexican heroin that's an epidome nick the northeast and midwest of this country and i'm sorry to tell you the distribution point is phoenix, arizona so he is assembling a team that i believe could be listened to, life is full of anecdotes. as you know, president-elect trump during the campaign said he was going to do waterboardi

the one thing we have learned in the baltic states is they have seen this movie before. this is not about one country or one country's election. estonia was attacked in 2007 just for moving a bronze statue, cyberattacked. lithuania was attacked. members of parliament, there were attempts to spy on them, bug them and when they invited members of crimea parliament in, they actually cut off their web access and did a cyberattack. this is something that they have done systematically. this was an attack not just on an american election or one political party. it is an attack on all democracies. that's why it's so important that the call for congress to do two things have come from republican and democratic senators. senator mccain and senator graham leading it. investigations, public hearings and then also, increased sanctions beyond what the administration may be announcing today. >> does seem this is one area where there is bipartisan support around something to come out of congress. the russian foreign minister responded to this news saying essentially bring it on. any hos

then it goes on to batter scandinavia and around the baltic sea.n see across the mediterranean, still some nasty weather through cyprus and turkey, with heavy snowfall inland, courtesy of low pressure. 0therwise some fina and dry weather. the intense high pressure will be building through the latter part of monday, pushing that windier weather away into the north sea and scandinavia, where it will cause some potential power outages and travel disruption. dangerous conditions — we've had and enormous waves already reported out to sea. coastal waves will be pretty large. through tuesday, as you saw — things are calming down. wednesday, the calming process continues. a lot of sunshine on tuesday, will be getting contaminated with low cloud and fog as we move into wednesday. where the fog lingers it will feel much colder. could be some freezing fog around. some nasty conditions around at the moment, however the amber warning in force for boxing day. as ever the details on the website. hello. this is breakfast, with naga munchetty. george michael, one o

and everywhere i go, and all these leaders i talk to them, a group of baltic leaders today. guess what? they want to know if they can depend on the united states of america, or do they have to accommodate? these little countries were part of the soviet empire, and then subpart of the soviet union for 70 -- 50 years. so what we need, and i think, and i believe that the people around president-elect trump have that kind of inner strength. it is not just mattis, who is our hero. but if he takes petraeus, or mitt romney, or john bolden. john bolden would shake up the state department in a way that is long overdue, my dear friends. [ applause ] >> so general kelly, there is nobody that knows more about our own hemisphere than general kelly. the way, a scourge, manufactured heroin that's an epidemic in the northwest, and midwest of the country. i'm sorry to tell you, the distribution point is phoenix, arizona. he is assembling a team. president-elect trump, during the campaign, said he was going to do waterboarding and worst. and then, just the other day, he said he asked general

you are just back a few months ago from some baltic states.t did you make of the reaction to the election on the ground and what it might say about russian relations him up but even for the ukraine and nato? pat: there is concern for ukraine in the baltic stakes, -- tates, especially given some of the comments made about nato. but the events of the last 24 hours of the trump administration into a box. it is not because of what obama did. it is because most congressional republicans, for the most part, supported the sanctions and the expulsion of the diplomats. if you look at paul ryan and the remarks he made, he was very critical of president obama, but supportive of his actions, and actually critical, saying they should have come sooner. if trump wants to roll back those sanctions or rollback this more confrontational stand putin -- with putin, he will face opposition. vonnie: paul ryan's reaction was strange. the first half of the sentence was it was great to have the sanctions, but the rest of the paragraph went on to say it should have hap

john mccain and lindsey graham overseas on a trip to the baltic nations. the retaliatory measures by the obama administration are long overdue, but they are a small price to pay. we intend to lead the efforts in the new consciogress. house speaker paul ryan says russia does not share america's interests. it has consistently sought to undermine then. today's action by the administration is overdue, it is appropriate to end eight years of failed policy with russia. it is a prime example of the ineffective foreign policy that left america weaker in the eyes of the world. senate leader chuck schumer strongly supports the obama administration's work to fight back against russia's interference in the election. we need to punch back and punch back hard. >>> turning to politics. a buffalo, new york school board looking to oust carl paladino who co- chaired the new york campaign for trump. he wanted to see the president die from mad cow disease and the first lady living with a gorilla in africa. the school board giving him 24 hours to resign. if he doesn't, it will

i talked to a group of baltic leaders, today. they want to know if they can depend on the net states of america -- united states of america. these countries were part of the soviet union for 50 years. what we need, and i believe that the people around president-elect trump, have that kind of inner strength. ,, but if just mattis or john mitt romney bolton. he would shake up the state department in a way that is long overdue. general kelly, nobody that knows more about our own hemisphere. there is a manufactured mexican heroin that is a epidemic in the northeast and midwest of this country. the distribution point is phoenix, arizona. he is assembling a team that i believe should be listened to. life is full of anecdotes. during the campaign, he said he would do waterboarding and worse, and the other day, he ,aid he asked general mattis and he said he could do much better with a pack of cigarettes and a sixpack of beer. word, and ikes his think he will. the message has to be sent that the united states of america is not interested

putin is testing nato in the baltic states.stions for donald trump are will he continue the energy and financial sanctions that president obama, chancellor merkel and the e.u. have put on putin? will he continue the deployment of american and nato forces into the baltic states and poland to contain putin and to deter any kind of trouble with our nato allies? all the signs from donald trump are very troubling. is he going to stapd up and support him? these are the questions, i think, that go well beyond one nomination. >> they're important questions. do you think that the now senate majority leader mitch mcconnell are being too flippant in their words? >> i'm a very close friend of condoleezza rice, and she's my former boss. i have great respect for condoleezza rice and bob gates, and i take their opinions very seriously. i think rex tillerson is an impressive man with an impressive background, but my focus has to be -- i think all of our focus has to be on what is donald trump going to do? he is going to be the president. he wi

they were in the baltic region trying to deliver's message to reassure america's allies that america will have their back if there is confrontation with vladimir putin in russia. these are small countries are we are talking about, but a big issue starting about three weeks from now. let me explain why quickly. you have russia and obviously vladimir putin's country. what happened a couple of years ago? russia went and annexed crimea right down here. part of ukraine and russia who said they are part of the russian federation by the united states and allies around the world. outcry of objection to this, but russia took crimea. the fear is that they are next. vladimir putinme wants to expan. he went to es tonia and lat via. they got independence and feared a russian leader would come back and try to bring them back to russia. that is the fear. look at this. these flags are part of nato. the united states is part of nato. lithuania is part of it as well. they said one important thing. if you attack one of the members, you attack all of us. if russia went to lithuania or lat via or es toni

to use his capacity to influence politics internally with respect to the baltics. there are pro-russian parties in those very states and he could easily provide financial support to create opposition. he could threaten to cut off energy supplied to the baltics so they are 100% dependent on russia for natural gas. he could create a crisis, i think, in terms of simply threatening, if you will, for example, to perhaps be even more active and hostile unless the baltics withdraw from nato. the question is, how does nato respond to that? we have to be careful about it. i think if he sees weakness, he will act on it. i think he has perceived weakness in recent years. i think it was a mistake to cancel the antiballistic missiles program. that we had started to deploy in poland. and the czech republic, he believes given the fact that we have operated a pretty dramatic reduction in our nuclear capability, we have not responded to what the russians are doing and the chinese, to upgrade their capabilities. we operate under the idea that if we deemphasize our capability , then

there's a serious issue for europe and the creeping of russia into the baltic region.hits the pages every day across europe and is less talked about here. but an important area. >> they're unnerved. >> unnerved. certainly the baltic regions. criticism of nato by donald trump in the election campaign. one area where people wonder is that something he sticks to or will he actually back up some of those u.s. allies. >> or maybe productive. i remember henry kissinger making comments yesterday written up saying we want somebody with good dialogue already with russia because that's one of the critical missions here, and it hasn't worked in this administration. >> dialogue is important, but you don't want to step back and allow president putin to do what he wants in that region. >>> we are approaching the top of the hour, the team is getting ready for "squawk box." kayla tausche has a look at what's coming up on that show. >> it's all about the markets for us. you guys have been talking about futures being in the green, u.s. ten-year and european trading piercing 2.6%. first

intention to at least try that out, that becomes a serious problem for nato, for poland, for the baltictates. packed -- that relationship is at its weakest at any point since world war ii. charlie: and russia stands ready to benefit as they could? ian: i can see why they wouldn't. putin has no internal challenges. he doesn't necessarily need an american money, he can just show he's winning on things like syria and ukraine and with trump as opposed to obama. is ard: russia and putin bigger concern than china. has though xi jinping consolidated norma's power, there are still some checks and balances. russia, by contrast, is not a real economy. it is an oil and gas economy and is not integrated into the region in the world. putin has drained institutions in russia of their power. thes just at the time of missile crisis faced far more constraints than putin faces now. russia is a singular challenge and facing europe at a time when europe is less united than it -- if flat in her putin wants to do something reckless in the baltics, there's no one who will say you can't do that and that will g

troops to dissuade putin from doing that or even to defend the baltics? >> i know there's been lots of conversations about what does it took like to push back on the russians? and so when you look at what happened in the last eight years you saw, we really walked way from ukraine. we walked away from the troop increase of russian in georgia. we did this chemical deal that i lie e alienated our deals. you see a dale maker who comes in and resets the negotiation table. i don't have -- there's nothing that i would believe that i've seen certainly from my time dealing with people who are now in positions in the transition that they would walk away from any aggressive activity with russia but i do think they are trying to say there's a different way we'll do this. we eat doer this with a tougher negotiation stance, peace through strength, do better nato operations, some talk about going in and having joint operations in poland and other places militarily. so i think that changes the conversation pretty quickly. we're getting hung up on this issue. listen, amer

and then they look across their western border to the baltics and they see this nato messy build up going on and russians above and below say no western power has amassed on our border like this since the german invasion in 1941. you don't want high anxiety among people who have nuclear weapons on high alert. >> he just said to take action. and can you say that that is -- it seems to you like a declaration of war. that's your assessment. >> no, you misunderstand. that's what the russians are interpreting it as. >> i got it. >> and -- did say about a month ago we will retaliate. it's time to walk back, and fast. i think that's what secretary of state kerry was trying to do today when he said he didn't embrace this story. >> thank you. >> are you sure? it was okay. i didn't upset you. >> no, not at all. always a pleasure. >> up next president obama vowing to take action action on russia's alleged hacking. but what are his options with just 36 days left in his term? at godaddy, our goal is to make you look awesome online. let's chat in football terms. this is the goal post. the end zone. the

. >> the baltic states, yeah. >> yeah. the baltic states, georgia, ukraine. they are worried, because they are not quite sure what donald trump will be doing. i think they're probably quite worried right now about putin. you could argue deftly movingen around, maneuvering, taking his kind of judo-like steps, to play out the clock. i mean what he's saying is, i'm not dealing with obama. three weeks left to go. i'm going to deal with president trump. and president trump, too. he could have ordered the briefing, as we were just hearing, today. but he's doing it next week. so i think there's a lot of this playing out the clock, waiting until he's in office, and giving him time to really figure out now that -- now that he doesn't have to focus or shouldn't really be focusing on the 2016 election and what russia did. the real issue is, what does russia do, period, and what has it been doing for ten years? so that's the issue. and that's going to confront him when he gets into office. >> one of many pressing issues that will be front and center on his desk, the mome

but seriously, they are going to the baltic states. they are going to georgia. they are going to the craukrain. the message is pretty straightforward, make clear to putin that not everybody back in washington has a rosy view of him. to off assurance to our allies in those countries that america is still on their side. and so those two senators are looking for ground here. i don't know if they can ultimately try to stop tillerson's nomination, but they are going to make this confirmation process entirely about russia if they have anything to say about it. >> it's interestsing the choice because it's another -- we'll get to some of the others in a moment but one of these choices that trump has made to a degree unnerves the washington establishment. senator mccain and senator graham and marco rubio is in the same camp a friend of vladimir putin is not the right attorney secretary of state. that's what washington says. donald trump says during the campaign you're wrong. >> rex is friendly with many of the leaders in the world that we don't get along with and some pe

intention to at least try that out, that becomes a serious problem for nato, for poland, for the baltictates. the transatlantic relationship, the underpinning of history not happening in front of us every day, that relationship is now at its weakest at any point since world war ii. charlie: and russia stands ready to benefit as much as they can? ian: i cannot see why they would not. putin has no internal challenges. he doesn't necessarily need an american enemy he can just show , he's winning on things like syria and ukraine and with trump as opposed to obama. richard: russia and putin is a much more worrisome than china. even though xi jinping has consolidated enormous power there are still some checks and , balances. russia, by contrast, is not a real economy. it is an oil and gas economy and is not integrated into the region or the world. putin has drained institutions in russia of their power. he has de-institutionalized the country. during the missile crisis they faced far more constraints than putin faces now. russia is a singular challenge facing europe at a time when europe is l

invaded crimea, senator mccain and i and some of our democratic friends met with delegation from the baltic countries just this past week to say they're nervous about the russians, is to put it mildly. >> now, contrast to that to what we've heard from the president-elect. mr. trump told fox news he doesn't believe russia tried to influence the election to help him. today took to twitter and tweeted this. unless you catch, quote/unquote, hackers in the act, it is very hard to determine who was doing the hacking, why wasn't this brought up before the election? the answer is a resounding, yes, of course, we have been reporting about russian interference into the elections since june. let's begin with our go-to guy on capitol hill, manu raju. there is a major battle looming over this investigation. >> reporter: absolutely, brooke. this is going to overshadow a lot of things donald trump may want to do in the beginning parts of the new administration, the new congress. now, this investigation is probably going to take shape in both the house and the senate intelligence committees as well as the

previously we didn't have any issues in terms of energy supplies to the baltic states. everyone, everything has been running smoothly. our european partners always tell us that we need to come together, we need to move closer and find common ground, well exactly the opposite is happening here. they have disrupted our relationship in such a key area as energy. certainly we will resolve this issue and we will ensure energy independence. as you've heard we will supply liquefied natural gas. we plan to build a power plant. we might choose small scale nuclear plants produced in russia. this is one of the key area for the development. we need to have some kind of energy resources. road construction, infrastructure, certainly there are a lot of issues. i just mentioned to but there are others pending. the most important thing we need to provide is the use of the opportunities which is really close to our european partner. it needs to be economically aligned in the economy, in terms of the preferences they reach. you had a free community of those preferences but instead you now

mccain and senator lindsay graham are in the baltic states right now to reassure them of the u.s. commitment to tear defense. >>> in a wake-up call, u.s. prosecutors indicted three chinese citizens, prosecutors allege they earned more than $4 million in illegal profits from the alleged scheme, prosecutors say relied on stealing private information from law firms out of financial plans. one of the traders was arrested in hong kong, prosecutors did not disclose the whereabouts of the other two men. >>> and then there is this heart warming story as panthers quarterback cam newton met with a young fan after hearing of his heart condition. watch as ten-year-old austin got to see and hug his hero in the flesh after his teacher asked for prayers along social media, along that her post get so widely shared it gets newton to austin's bedside. it looks like she was able to get her wish. the nfl quarterback said he must have been called over 100 times over the boy and just had to pay him a visit. >>> ahead, police look to amazon echo to help solve a murder case. plus, why one boss has taken