and as i looked at that, that's what prevailing looks like in centcom. that's what winning looks like today. it's about our partners achieving their objectives and us being value to them. in 1789, george washington wrote a letter to mohammed bin abdullah, at the time the sultan of morocco. morocco, as many of you know, was the first country to recognize the united states as a sovereign nation. in his letter, he wrote, "within our territories, there are no mines, whether of gold or silver, and this young nation just recovering from the waste and disillusion of a long war has not as yet had time to acquire riches by agriculture or commerce, but our soil is bountiful and our people industrious, and we have reason to flatter ourselves that we shall gradually become useful to our friends." the united states has come a long way over the last 230 years, but the desire of the united states to be of importance and value to our allies and partners in the arab world has not changed. this instance clearly shows that we treasure our long-held relationships, not only

under centcom, the uae fought against the taliban in afghanistan. we were there on day one in the skies against isis, and we are together now in yemen fighting together. as the partnership goes back a long way, far back to the 1980's and 1990's, forged a close working relationship with general norman. actually more, they developed a friendship. here we are many decades later, where i have the privilege of introducing general votel today. this ownership has made the uae safe. it has made the region safe. but the point that gets overlooked is that partnership also makes the u.s. safe. of course there is much more to do, and we still have to make much more progress despite isis and al qaeda. and as we do, another extremist threat is gaining strength, and that is iran. newelcome president trump's strategy to address the full range of iranian interference and destabilization. this includes its growing ballistic missile program, fostering terrorist organizations, cyber attacks, interference in domestic deferment of freedom. bold toy was a intensify provoc

under centcom the uae fought with the u.s. against the taliban and afghanistan. we were there on day one in disguise against isis. and we are together now in yemen fighting al qaeda together. this partnership goes back a long way. as far back as the late '80s and early '90s, the crown prince of abu dhabi forged a close working relationship with general schwartz cop. it was actually more than a working relationship. they developed a friendship. here we are decades later where i have the honor of introducing general votel today. it's made the region safe. but the point that gets overlooked far too often is that partnership also made the u.s. safe. there's much more to do and we have to make progress despite our best efforts against isis and al qaeda. as we do another has been gaining strength and that threat is iran. we welcome president trump's new strategy to address the full range of iranian interference and destabilization. this includes its growing ballistic missile program, support for terrorist organizations, cyber attacks, interference in each others domest

south can you calm centcom and now africa. under the stated goals of fighting terrorism and providing humanitarian assistance afrikan implanted itself on the continent conducting military exercises with a growing number of african countries. but was this the only reason for africa for pos create god i saw it but i don't hold any thought that the oil is there is out there i mean sort of course you know is that a private area was up in utah is a notorious list there for so who are some of the b.o.c. daughter or. security i don't know is also going to make a good i don't they are us the press or the screwed up by government just of all that she. had for me. established itself as a counterweight to french and american interests on the continent. in the first decade of the twenty first century china had overtaken the rest of the world to become africa's not just trading. is also called snowball if you don't want to tip it's also it's not at all about the creative force a thought under the need to do so was a fake gun or designed fo

iraq with the rise of the insurgency is special operations are called in as the manhunt to find a centcom is and his son if they do find them he is captured and it is hoped initially that decapitation strike will put a lid on the uncertainty and there are others that are willing and ready so we find ourselves in the prolonged insurgency campaign and around this time still lead crystal comes in as the commander with the task force that he sets up in iraq and at the time those that got the lead forces shelled the focus on the big targets but the crystal decides we cannot do that in saddam shows he looks for ways to revamp up their operations and does that effectively. hearing there is only 10 operations per month with 300 in 2006 this is made by a grant of communications technology without a lot of thought to the thought they are getting intercepted so that we can destroy that insurgency we also have another term which is the operator's that is made the special forces and the navy seals at this time. and they want to do this surgical strike precision raid to hold a now in the middle of the

he was at centcom. this is often the case an officer will visit the parents of the enlisted soldiers and marines. but general mattis didn't have to do this, obviously. he drove by himself. didn't have a driver. didn't have a military gear. out of the military at this point. he thought it was so important. what does jim mattis or john kelly think any donald trump? >> i hope he calls them and asks them. >> as robert mueller's reach extends deeper in white house, could the president's old catch phrase "you're fired" come back to haunt him? i'm ryan and i quit smoking with chantix. smoking was comforting. it was like a security blanket. it made me feel good, it really did. i would doubt myself that i could actually quit, but with chantix i did it. along with support, chantix (varenicline) is proven to help people quit smoking. chantix reduced my urge to smoke. when you try to quit smoking, with or without chantix, you may have nicotine withdrawal symptoms. some people had changes in behavior or thinking, ag

you were deployed under centcom and africom, several operations, what are the biggest unanswered questionswell, we're going too get -- thank you. we're going to get questions after the investigation is doesn't and we have the soldiers there. we've got green berets in contact, we've got the support soldiers. this was a chaotic ambush out in a remote environment. these guys were operating at some level of risk any wastways. this is a continuation of a mission we've run relatively routinely. i'm not sure that right now we have anything to really be concerned about except that when that information comes in, we'll know precisely how our forces were dispositioned and what the enemy forced were there. this was a chaotic scene, so it's going to take a little time but we'll get there. >> talk about the investigation right now, the investigators on the ground, whab are they doing? >> right now what they're doing is looking at what they can possibly see from the standpoint of what types of weapons were used against the u.s. special forces, they're looking at what the angle of attack was, where did t

backed coalition, centcom, and the u.s., have come forward to congratulate the kurdish force with u.s. backing that kicked isis out of raqqah. but this is a pretty hollow victory because raqqah was never really was a kurdish town. they were used to kick isis out. it's been absolutely damaged beyond recognition now. sadly the issue is, who can rebuild, is there enough american attention and money to make that actually happen, and potentially is there a risk, the syrian regime, not far away, may try to take it or those local populations who had some sympathies with isis, end up coming back in and allow jihadists there to have some sort of foothold again. huge questions but also absolute total devastation for that city. we did not see one civilian in the entire time we were there. just the fighters who kicked isis out. john, poppy. >> a tragic violent past but a precarious future. nick paton walsh, thanks so much. >>> a perfect ten, that is how the president rates himself when it comes to the response to hurricane maria and pu

it's always been behind in the news to centcom in the middle east or ucom in europe. and now it's bubbled into front page news and it takes a while for congress or noor matter the mi tear military to assess or policy s. there a danger, the military establishment, not deliberately, becomes its own thing. forget. maybe thighs congressmen don't want to know 111 or whatever countries u.s. forces are in. using the word forget to let congress know, but is there an amount of detail sometimes doesn't get through over time? >> absolutely right. an old saying in the military, first reports are always wrong. second reports are usually wrong. one of the cardinal sins that you can make in the pentagon is to come out too early with too much information that eventually proves to be wrong. remember now, in this country, the size of two texasess there's only 100 operators in niger. so it's very, very difficult to get the level of granularity congress is demanding dealing with a country that's 7,000 miles away and one of the most inhospitable regions of the world. takes time. eventuall

india north to yemen in the south and from pakistan in the east to egypt in the west if you look at centcom on a map. qatar falls roughly in the center of that now and so the capabilities here laois to reach out on order to any corner of the second region out of value did we strike or we fly aircraft across a range of capability so tankers airlift their medical back surveillance reconnaissance and strike aircraft so all those things are layered together through the orders of the combined air operations center to have those facts on target and the persistence to be able to go after isis on demand when the targets arise u.s. forces do not walk alone in a later date they are in a coalition of more than twenty countries one of them is the united kingdom. the erb ace has sophisticated systems and equipment installed to meet everyone's requirement it will be difficult to replicate just the complexity and sophistication of what we all have here at our leader because of investment over time the investment in money the investment in people almost a thousand people work in the air operations center t

we were in all the commands, africom, centcom and talking about the threats in all these regions. at a time when i hear colleagues across the aisle and political pundits ask the question, why do we have troops in various places like africa, it's important to remember the strategic importance of africa. i remember ten years ago we had -- we didn't have a command for africa. it was a part of three commands. you had pacific command, the central command, and european command. now we have africom, its own command. and it seemed a little unreasonable we were treating africa as somewhat of a stepchild when that's the breeding ground that is out there for a lot of things that are happening in terms of the terrorism. so despite our military's reach and influence, our nation's shrinking defense budget has put africom at risk during a time when the commanders are saying that we face the most dangerous world that we've ever faced. and we have. right now we are -- i've often said i look wistfully at the days of the cold war. we had two super powers. they knew what we had. we knew what they had

mcmaster was with us in the surge in centcom and then afghanistan.e with his deputy, top of his class at west point, successful businessman, to soar in the reserves. these are good people and then obviously jim mattis and others. very strong national security argument as good as any in recent memory, if not better. and, frankly, i think the policy process and the policy outcomes generally are quite rational. now, there is something to the so-called, it's actually called the madman logic if you will. before you get into a crisis, it's not all that bad if the other side thinks you're a little bit edgy. nixon had kissinger go tell the soviets hey, nixon is under a lot of pressure. he has a drink after dinner, be careful, walk on eggshells around the sky. and they sort of did. you avoid getting into a crisis. the problem is if you do get into a crisis, you don't want the other side thinking you've taken the slack out of the trigger already entered going to do something otherwise might be irrational. because they may do to you first. that's where my conce

a day on a battlefield they didn't know what to do with it so they came up with the idea through centcom which is central command decided to create burn pits to burn the trash that was being accumulated. over that is is where the military during the war collected all their waste in one central location and sort of burying it they decided to burn it they burn everything that you can possibly think of what they take the bright. moon. why we would burn less human waste. trash and. plastics medical. supplies. to name. anything that they wouldn't use anymore they were burned. at times they also had. body pipes. plastics chemicals paint batteries tires literally anything that could be disposed of was thrown in there. and it we were dumped these. days a few elaina. and then lighting that. there was a blue smoke and the haze looked like the san francisco for the smell was extremely toxic very very putrid burn your eyes burn your throat burn your nose i mean it was just nasty dirty stinky. some days the. concoction of the smell of the burn ph and the sewage pit would literally make you would drop

mcmaster with us in the surge in centcom and ask. same with his deputy.rilliant scholar, top of his class at west point. successful businessman. two-star in the reserves. these are really successful people and jim mattis and the others. a very strong national security team. arguably as good as any in recent memory if not better. and, frankly, i think the policy process and the policy outcomes generally are quite rational. now, there is something to the so-called -- it's actually called the mad man logic, if you will. before you get into a crisis, it's not all that bad if the other side thinks you're a little bit edgy. and, you know, nixon had kissinger go tell the soviets, hey, you know, nixon's under a lot of pressure. he has a drink after dinner, you know, be careful, walk on egg shells around this guy. they sort of did. you know, you avoid getting into a crisis. the problem is, if you do get into a crisis, you don't want the other side thinking that you're -- you've taken the slack out of the trigger already and you're going to do something that otherw

later, centcom commander general joseph hotel on the mid -- votel on the middle east. >> testifying before the senate judiciary committee today, attorney general jeff sessions defended president trump's position to fire fbi director james comey, and the decision to rebecca obama administration criminal justice reforms. while serving in the senate, jeff sessions previously sat on the

later, centcom commander general joseph hotel on the mid -- votel on the middle east. >> testifying before the senate judiciary committee today, attorney general jeff sessions defended president trump's position to fire fbi director james comey, and the decision to rebecca obama administration criminal justice reforms. while serving in the senate, jeff sessions previously sat on the judiciary committee. senator chuck -- chuck ensley chairs this five-hour hearing. [indiscernible] [gavel pounding] [indiscernible] >> attorney general sessions, welcome. for all the people in the audience, we welcome you as well. i thank general sessions were being here that attorney general sessions were being here for the oversight hearing. his is an opportunity for congress to investigate and question the policies and actions of any executive branch. it is an opportunity for the executive branch to take responsibility for any of those policies and actions, and an opportunity for congress to defend its constitutional powers and check any abuses by an overreaching executive branch, and it has been that way for