joining me live in studio, msnbc military analyst jack jacob.th. >> good morning, alex. >> senator, i'll begin with you. does the senate relations committee know the president was going to make the statement he did yesterday on iran and what was your reaction to it. >> i heard about it, as a lot of people did, in the early morning hours. i was not surprised but i was outraged, i think like a lot of americans are. by one count, the iranians have lied to the international community three times and been caught in three instances. it's time now to very seriously consider and i would support sanctions of one kind or another. we can continue to talk, continue to engage but we have to use sanctions. the congress has a number of measures to do that. one example i'm looking at is the divestment of mention fund assets, where pension funds, they want to take pension funds out of companies doing business with iran, prohibited by a series of cases that have been litigated over the years. so we want to get the state department to do that. we want to give the

david hoffman, jack jacobs, colonel here in the studio with me as well as john donnelly.or weighing in. >>> for a developing situation at any time and interactive look at key political players in iran, head to msnbc.com and click on world news. >>> a deadly day in iran, two suicide car bombs killing 16 people, wounding more than 150. the car bomb you see here destroyed a police station and nearby homes. the taliban is claiming responsibility for that attack. >>> back in this country, it is the story of the three alleged burglars and a baby. police nabbed two women and a man when the trio was stopped police saw they were driving around with a baby in the back seat. a postal carrier spotted them driving around and backing into the driveway. he got help from a retired police officer who chased him in the car for 20 minutes before police caught them. >>> now to the mysterious disappearance of a california woman. last week police arrested 24-year-old patrice richardson after she was unable to pay her $89 bill at a malibu restaurant. they found a small amount of marijuana in he

jack jacobs. >> short but tough. >> this is ominous, to say the least.f the president is going to listen to the general's on the ground, we're going to have to send more troops over there. is that the right move? >> i think we're going to have a send a lot more troops. i think it's not yet clear how many troops he's going to ask for. i think it's more than most people think. they say he needs twice as many twoops as he's got there now. the real question is whether or not we have the right strategy to use the troops properly in a war that's probably going to go on for a long period of time. >> do we have the appetite for this? >> no, i don't think so. >> do we have the resources for this? i thought we depleted resources as what was going on in iraq? >> the president said as a campaign promise we were going to get out of the bad war, iraq, get into the war in afghanistan to protect against the afghanistan. i don't think after years of war we have the resources to make it happen over a period of time. >> is there an exit strategy? >> there's plan to get out

. >> and we are joined right now by nbc news military analyst jack jacobs. good afternoon.have presidented me dead vef welcoming the president's decision. >> he would, wouldn't he? >> woechl he was against it when things were being planned both the czech republic and poland. how is this about appeasing russia? >> it is about apaegz russia. don't forget we are not going to be able to do anything about enforcing any of the restrictions on iran or prevent them from developing nuclear weapons without russia's help. as a matter of fact, russia's got lots of advisers in iran help them develop nuclear when pops and until we get russia on our side that is not going to happen. we are not going to be able to squeeze iran. this goes a long way to getting russia to get on our side to assist in stopping iran from what it's doing. >> people care about using the word appeasing russia? isn't this about not angering them further? >> well, we certainly did anger them. the last administration did two things which angered russia. >> yeah. >> and got them much more paranoid than they usually ar

colonel jack jacobs, thank you for your perspective.ice to talk to you today. >> you're welcome. >>> straight ahead, finding consensus on health care. president obama works to bring democrats together. can the party find common ground? you're watching "andrea mitchell reports" only on msnbc. ♪ (announcer) transform your water. women who drink crystal light drink 20% more water. crystal light. make a delicious cha proclaims "gq" magazine. did you see that? the interior "positively oozes class," raves "car magazine." "slick and sensuous," boasts "the washington times." "the most striking vw in recent memory," declares-- okay, i get it already. i think we were in a car commercial. ♪ yeah ♪ yeah. (announcer) what are you going to miss when you have an allergy attack? achoo! (announcer) benadryl is more effective than claritin at relieving your worst mptoms. and works when you need it most. benadryl. you can't pause life. ♪ so blessed with inspiration ♪ ♪ i don't know much ♪ but i know i love you ♪ and that may be ♪ all i need ♪ to know (ann

. >>> joining us now is retired army colonel jack jacobs, a recipient of the congressional military of honor and msnbc military analyst. what do you make of the election chaos over there? >> it's not surprising in view of what has always happened in that part of the world. we saw a lot of the same thing in iraq, too. but iraq at least has had some history of having elections and afghanistan has had no history of having a central government to which there's any -- for which there is any allegiance from the provinces. that kind of stuff is not surprising. there's lots of corruption in the provinces as well. and the impact of the fraud, alleged fraud lens about the election there is less on inside afghanistan than it is on the american political process. that's going to have a great effect on the congress who has to write the check to increase the size of the forces, american forces in afghanistan and continue the mission there. >> jack, as we've note there is a debate shaping up in washington and, of course, oorned around the world about the u.s. mission in afghanistan. a couple of conse

we join jack jacobs, good morning. >> good morning. >> i want to talk about what we just mentioned. what do you think of this list? >> there are two more in the article. the israeli dispute and iraq. he mentioned all five. he spent time talking about what most people think are convinced is the biggest problem that's not on the list. it's pakistan. politically fragmented, extremely weak centrally, it's full of corruption. security service has bad guys in it. they won't go in the northwest area to assist the united states, that's the most dangerous. and, they have nukes. >> speaking of that, what about the threats from north korea and iran. direct talks with north korea as well. how will they help? >> they are not going to hurt. we haven't done any real diplomacy with any of these countries. we have exercised in public how they are bad people. we haven't been doing anything, really, to change the situation. with direct talks, we mikt might, if they are in secret. the variables are they are third world countries. the problem with china is they haven't been helpful in squeezing north ko

. >>> and jack jacobs is a military analysts. the developments will play in with the decision now? >> heavily. they will not affect politics inside afghanistan, where the place where all politics are local to quote the late tip o'neal. and it may have a very big effect. the perception is we are shoring up the central government not capable of handling politics outside kabul, that cannot defend against the bad guys and will be fraudulent to boot, i think especially going into an election cycle, it will be difficult for the government and white house to get support in the congress in particular to write the check for any additional troops or long-term commitment. >> is there a number that you think would be realistic? right now we are told we will be at 68,000 by the end of the year in afghanistan. is there an increase that could get through? >> i think mcchrystal is asking for another 10,000. two things about that. first, it probably is not enough. the real number is somewhere in the neighborhood of 100,000, which would be an addi

let's bring inc colonel jack jacobs. >> i don't think it's going to have a big impact on how things are perceived inside afghanistan. inside afghanistan all politics are local. or allegiance is not to the government in kabul. afghanistan never had a central government that controlled the rest of the country. the real impact is going to be on the american perception of the mission in afghanistan, whether or not we should continue there. how many resources we are willing to commit. we have been there a long, long time already. and the president is saying we need to be there longer, still. militarily, he is right. what you are talking about, election fraud, an increase in the activity with the taliban, it's going to have a negative impact on the president's ability to get the congress to write the check for the mission. >> we know there has been a debate with the troop number of how much to add or to add at all. david axelrod was on "meet the press." let's play that clip. >> the main thing is, we have to keep focused on what our mission was there, which was to disable and destroy al qaeda

. >> okay, so, mike, i have colonel jack jacobs, who is a retired u.s. army colonel. jack, when we are talking about strategy, isn't that something that commander in chief should know, until i know for sure what our strategy s aren't you supposed to know that? >> start at the end and work backwar backwards. the mission and object ittive is the important thing, you decide on that and then decide what resources you are going to use. sort of got it back to front. if he has already committed resource there is, there are going to be 68,000 american troops there pretty soon. before you decide how you're going to use them, that's probably got it back to front. >> okay, here is general stanley mcchrystal said in this, supposed to be a confidential report, but as i said before it has been leaked now to the "washington post," when we are looking at some of his dire warnings, he says, look, without these additional troops, we could be risking failure but here it is. "the weakness of state institutions, malign actions of power-brokers, widespread corruption and abuse of power by v

we want to get to msnbc's military analyst, retired army colonel jack jacobs. your new book out, your memoir, "if not now, when" can be found in book stores around the country it looks like they are trying to sort through three major different strategies k you go through them with me? >> well, one strategy is to cede to general mcchrystal's request somewhere in the neighborhood of 40 or 45,000 more troops of specific types be sent to afghanistan. another option, quite a few options but another option is to have about half that number added to what general mcchrystal has and third option is to just pull out altogether. it is unlikely the last will be the case. most likely event, quite frankly, they will pick a suboptimal situation and instead of giving general mcchrystal everything that he says he needs, they will select something between zero and that which will probably not be enough in order for him to accomplish his mission. >> okay to, but if they give him everything he says he needs, if he says i need x-number of troops and i need them by january 1st and t

with me now, retired army colonel jack jacobs, who is also a recipient of the medal of honor. what are your thoughts watching the parents receive this award posthumously, their son shot down? >>> a terrible thing. nobody should outlive his children but this -- having known the parents of other recipients who received the award posthumously, meeting them from time to time at medal of honor functions, i know that there is a great deal of pride in knowing that there -- the acts of their children have become inspirations for others, not just in the military but also for other people who hear of their acts and recognize that they are not acts necessarily of physical courage, but instead, acts of moral courage and that we all have to make contributions to our own communities every opportunity we have, not just a question of fixing bayonets and charging the enemy, lots of things that have to be done every day everywhere in the united states, and these -- this is a motivation those people are doing. >> to put this into perspective, jared monti, one of the stories the president just to

. >> joining us is retired army colonel and military analyst jack jacobs whose memoir comes out on mondayyou for joining us. >> good to be here. >> 68,000 is not a small number of troops. some are saying today that it is not the number, it is how these men aem and women have been misused or used over the past couple of years in afghanistan. >> we've been in there eight years and not a lot to show for it. we had some success but eliminating when we took smo most of the forces and sent them to iraq. you're right. it's not the number of forces. mcchrystal wants more than that. but it's also who they are. we need more trainers, more special forces, more special operations forces and more intelligence forces. these are not infantry divisions and marine units to knock doors down and so on. these are people who are operate by training local militias and so forth. i don't think they are in the pipeline to send. >> let me ask on that note. isn't mcchrystal, isn't the general saying i need a lot more troops if this is going to be your strategy? if we're focus on the counterinsurgency the only way t

joining us now, retired army colonel and military analyst, msnbc's jack jacobs. a good morning to you, again, colonel. >> hi, alex. >> i read about a few of these countries that i mentioned that could pose a major problem for president obama. what do you think of this list? >> well, they also included at arab/israeli dispute over palestine and iraq as well. but he didn't -- all of these are problem areas, but he did have a lot to say about pakistan, which most observers would say is really the most dangerous place at the moment. it's politically fragmented. it's got a weak central government. it's got lots of corruption, lots of bad guys, taliban, al qaeda sympathizers inside the intelligence apparatus, and it doesn't spend a lot of time up in the northwest trying to fight the bad guys on the other side of the afghan border, which we'd like them to do. occasionally, they'll go in there and cooperate with us, but we need more support if we're going to get rid of these people, but pakistan is not doing it. so, he talked a little bit about that. and by the way, they

. >> with us on the set here, jack jacobs. richard and others lay it out as failure as the option if you do not escalate for the troops. my question for you is what is the mission? what is the mission in afghanistan, not winning or losing, but relative to u.s. interests going back to the reason we went in? >> i think the president is asking the same question, and so is gates, secretary defense gate and mccrystal. you can't commit anything, any resource until you first articulate what it is you are trying to do. until you do that, you are going to wind up throwing resources at a problem you had not even articulated. that's the problem that the administration has. >> i want to go over some of the similarities between the current state of the war in afghanistan and the war in iran. a lack of defining goal or clear progress. this mission creep or mission retrenchment. are we suffering where we will find the soldiers something to do, or what? >> i think mcchrystal knows what he wants to do with the soldiers. don't forget the campai

. >> retired army colonel jack jacobs with us, author of "if not now, when," an issue that would go to obama administration and the defense secretary thinking? in other words, are they playing diplomacy with russia? are they playing diplomacy with iran? are they playing a budget game? why would you make a decision to either install or not install long-range or short-range missiles in eastern europe, period? >> two of those three things are at work. first, is the relationship with russia. we did two things in the last administration which made it much more difficult for russia to get together with us, to put pressure on iran. one was this. and it really annoyed them that we were putting -- we were saying we were going to try to defend against an attack by iran on western europe, but, in fact, their perception was it was against russia. they didn't like that very much. >> let me be very direct. is this an overtur fre from the white house to puti in and russia, to bring them closer, by conceding the missile deployment to put pressure on russia to put a squeeze on iran? >> i think that's o