so the bad news is the pentagon's books are a big fiscal mess. in fact, the defense department is the very last federal agency to comply with a federal law decades old requiring an annual audit. it took 28 years after congress enacted a law requiring every federal agency to conduct an annual audit for the pentagon to get its ducks in a row. unfortunately the results are not what it's quacked up to be. as required by the 1990 chief financial officer's act, the bean counters at the department of defense disclose their financial assessments for fiscal year 2019 to the office of inspector general, and then the i.g. deployed 1,400 auditors to 600 sites around the world. these 1,400 auditors at 600 different sites surveyed $2.9 trillion in assets and tallied $2.8 trillion in liabilities. after spending $1 billion to conduct this audit, the department of defense inspector general was unable to issue a clean opinion. and that's the goal that we seek. just like other departments can get clean opinions, why can't the defense department so do? the case is t

s budget and this is no mistake this is for all the pentagon's accounting fraud die.many billions of dollars that could be devoted to other national needs indeed the pentagon accounting fraud amounts to death on a grand scale def not only for america's taxpayers but also from the nation's well being and its future so right after the nation came out with this this past week alexandria ocasio cortez tweeted about it basically saying that these unaccounted trillions at the pentagon could help pay for medicare for all this story is starting to gain traction people can see the truth and right now it is the corporate media tools who are trying to make sure you think it's just some accounting there's pay no mind to the fact that it amounts to the largest theft ever perpetrated against the american people this week called for keeping troops in iraq to watched iran watch iran. not realize we monitor other nations with satellites and spy ware because you think we do are watching of other countries from like windows or the like a dude in a base in iraq with an ocular sorry just

and after shanahan dropped that bombshell here's what followed reporter what part did the pentagon fail in the audit shanahan how about i give you a technical version of that there are a considerable number of areas where we kind of had a pass and then there is some other ones where they went through and we wouldn't do your inventory serves them and we didn't find these things and therefore there's a finding you don't have a clean assessments so. a lot of these audit it's it's the type of finding that matters. if they were in the real reporting looks like they can check out the investigative exposé from the nation magazine that came out a couple of days ago the nation says it's for decades the d.o.d.'s leaders and accountants have been perpetrating a gigantic unconstitutional accounting fraud deliberately cooking the books to mislead the congress and drive the d.o.d.'s budget ever higher deal d. has literally been making up numbers in the annual financial reports to congress so here's here's how this fraud works every year the pentagon tells congress how much money they need they submit

so gabe this decision by the pentagon how significant is it. it's quite significant actually because earlier on tuesday the pentagon said only about 300 saudi military personnel on bases in the state of florida where the shooting took place would have their training suspended but just in the last few minutes the pentagon has confirmed that now department of defense secretary mark esper has white in that to be all military personnel from saudi arabia in bases all over the united states we think that's about 850 maybe 852 saudi military personnel that will be affected by this top to bottom shut down it only affects the saudi arabia students that are here they're about 4000 other military personnel from other countries over 150 countries but this is focused just on the saudi arabians as the as the f.b.i. and the pentagon reviews the shooting on friday and they see if there's any other connections that the shooter had to any of the other saudi military personnel that are in the country the united states currently on many bases these saudi arabian s

house began to realize the pentagon was slow rolling, which the pentagon does with all sorts of things. in this case, it was clear. tis was concerned about getting into a war with iran and the middle east. even though he had been an iran skeptic, he thought the iran nuclear deal should stay in place not only because it was working but because we negotiated with her allies. the french and the germans, we should keep our word as united states. similarly with north korea, it is a fact that wars can happen inadvertently. a small incident can spiral into something much bigger and he did not want to take the risk. host: on iran, the planes were leaving when the president called off the mission. the president tweeting 10 minutes before a strike, i stopped it. brinkpulling off from the of conflict okayed by john bolton. guest: i think this is where jim mattis might have misunderstood the president. we were close to using force against iran. iran is not iraq. the population is three times larger. iran has ballistic missiles. it has a relatively capable military. iran wouldtion with be problemat

it was a decision that was taken very carefully by the pentagon.hey are calling it a safety stand down. even though there is a belief that this saudi national acted alone, it's not entirely confirmed yet from the fbi. that is why the pentagon is taking this decision to ground 303, to be exact, saudi pilots that were training at three different military bases in florida on this training exchange with the u.s. military. while they can do classroom work, they are barred from flying at all while this investigation continues. so it is quite significant. this accounts for about 40% of all saudi military officials that are in the u.s. taking part in training are affected by this, and the pentagon said the grounding of these 303 saudi pilots for now is at least indefinite. >> have investigator said whether they believe anymore saudi nationals were involved in this attack? >> they haven't said publicly yet, but they are still investigating and there's a lot of calls now for pentagon officials and u.s. officials to do a better job of venting foreign military

leaders of the pentagon.hat really transformed my life. assigned to the white house under president nixon and work for jon erlichman. what was that like? hank: i started in the pentagon, and april of 1972 six weeks before the watergate break-in. like he did not understand the implications at the time. i was there through the election, it was a landslide victory and i got a big promotion. erlichman'sto be deputy for economic policy. ,hen watergate hit and blew up and i watched these people at senior positions get carried off . erlichman got convicted after i had left, but i looked at a number of people there in deep trouble. it made a huge impression on me. the positive impression was george schultz was secretary of the treasury, he had two guys who worked for him that i had a good working relationship. david: you went back to chicago and joined goldman sachs. how did that come about? hank: careers are a funny thing. i have never been big on career engineering. when i graduated from dartmouth, i did not know w

many people in the pentagon had no idea that was coming. but you all discussed it and decided to do it? >> the deliberations were done by members to have national squounl the president of the united states. >> did you recommend? >> i recommended that we pulled out 28 special forces soldiers in the face of 15,000 turks that were going to invade. >> the gentleman yield for one quick second. >> in december, you were doing n a different job at the time. >> a year ago? talking about october? this past october? >> i'm going a different place. it is a yes or no question. in december, when you were the secretary of the army and the army chief of staff. to your knowledge, did anyone in pentagon before the president sent out hi tweet saying we were going to pull completely out of afghanistan, did anyone know to your knowledge? >> to your knowledge as the secretary of the army and to your knowledge, did anyone in pentagon know that announcement was coming? >> i don't know. i'm not trying to -- it is not a yes or no -- >> it is to your knowledge. >> as

with the truth this week 2 perspectives from players who were in the pentagon and in theater michael maloof worked for the secretary of defense as the u.s.a.'s longest war was unfolding and matthew hoh is a former u.s. marine he later resigned from the government over the escalation of the war in afghanistan his work now includes peer support for mental health and substance abuse disorder gentlemen welcome back thank you the newspaper describes it obgyn it as a confidential troll of government documents obtained by the washington post which reveals that senior u.s. officials failed to tell the truth about the war in afghanistan throughout the 18 year campaign making rosy pronouncements that they knew to be false and hide in unmistakable evidence that the war had become on winnable the post sources more than 2000 pages of previously unpublished notes of interviews with people who played a direct role in the war from generals and diplomats to aid workers and afghan officials and it's one hell of a read michael then matthew in that order in the weeks since this drop how does the washing

in that pentagon who are to be reminded that he is the commander in chief.urious with the generals of the pentagon and the way in which they have behaved under this president. it's outrageous, and i do think they have to be reminded. >> they have to make their case to the president that this deployment is necessary. and the president may decide not to approve it, he may decide to send a fewer number of troops over. i think what kt said is exactly right. but at the end of the day, the pentagon can talk about things like this, but the president makes the ultimate decision on whether this is justified. >> see, that's what bothers me. why are we talking about this right now? why was this leaked to the press? the president has not made his decision. why try to force his hand? and i think that's what this is all about. >> you're right. lou: where are the leaks coming from? is it coming from, are they coming from the pentagon, or are they coming from think tanks? are they coming from the military industrial complex? just -- the cia, perhaps? fred, your thoughts. >>

top leaders of the pentagon.really transformed my life. david: so you got assigned to -- for a little bit of time in government to the white house under president nixon and worked for jon erlichman. what was that like? hank: i started in the pentagon in april of 1972, six weeks before the watergate break-in. and so it looked like, you did not understand the implications at the time. i was there through the election. there was a landslide victory over mcgovern. i got a big promotion. i was going to be erlichman's deputy for economic policy. then watergate hit and blew up, and i watched these people at very senior positions get carried off. you know, erlichman got convicted after i had left, but i looked at a number of people there in deep, deep trouble. it made a huge impression on me, but the positive impression was george schultz, secretary of the treasury. he had two guys who worked for him that i had a good working relationship. david: you went back to your native midwest, chicago and joined goldman sachs. how

. >> to that point, barbara starr at the pentagon is still with us.pentagon wouldn't be involved, barbara, obviously you have a tragedy on a military installation. but i bet there is a bigger interest now to have the base investigated with the local authorities there and just keeping the pentagon looped in, i assume now because you have international complications this becomes much more a factor in your building. >> if it hasn't happened already, i think we can assume in matters like this the fbi will take it over. they have done so in these kinds of incidents in the past, obviously, and that means the navy, the pentagon, will be providing them with any information they want. in cases like this, certainly investigators will be talking to other students at pensacola. it would be a standard procedure, to see if they knew anything. did this person make any comments? was there any behavior, were there any indications that, you know, even now looking back? was there any history with this person? so all of that will be gone through. but, you know, the u.s.

i'm going to ask the pentagon to order a review.s he was confirmed, secretary asbury said, -- secretary esper said, i'm going to be taking another look this procurement. normally, these things are not done in such a public and controversial matter. taylor: bloomberg's naomi nix, thank you. coming up, world leaders are trying to teach tax big check. -- big tech. will the u.s. stand in the way of a global digital tax plan coming online? this is bloomberg. ♪ ♪ taylor: this is "bloomberg technology" global link where we join "bloomberg daybreak: australia" to bring you the latest in global tech news. i'm taylor riggs in san francisco, with shery ahn in new york and paul allen in sydney. let's take a look at the top global tech stories of the day. paul: thanks. the world's fourth largest smartphone maker is making his -- making its move in japan. xiaomi is entering the japanese market with a budget friendly smartphone and fitness tracker. the company is making the phone available for immediate preorder with shipments starting december 16

the pentagon is increasingly realizing it will have to make budgetary trade-offs. the projections for the budget looking ahead seem mostly flat, even though the administration has tried to make a case for increases. given that the budget may be flat, what sorts of trade-offs would you like the pentagon to be making to focus more on russia and china? what kind of outdated hardware should it get rid of? what should it be buying more of? how does the committee make that happen? rep. thornberry: back in the obama administration, they were big on the pivot to asia, implying you pivot to asia away from the middle east. it turns out the middle east doesn't let you go. i think you are exactly right. the new national defense strategy focuses more on the near peer competitors like russia and china, but the challenge of our times is we also have to pay attention to iran, north korea, terrorists, and other challenges. what i am hopeful about is the current secretary of defense, and general millie, the current chairman of the joint chiefs, together held what they called night c

the pentagon's top policy advisor. they have conducted attacks, and they were concerned about the threat string that they were seeing. with respect to that threat situation we are concerned about what we are seeing. >> so you are considering it. is 14,000 the correct number? or is there a lesser number? >> the secretary defense has not not made any decision. >> the american guided missile destroyer for a sermon an iranian small boat carrying missile parts bound for yemen where iran continues to support rebels engaged in the deadly civil war which has killed over 100,000 people since 2015. the aircraft carrier abraham lincoln recently entered the persian gulf, 14,000 additional troops have deployed to the middle east since may, half aboard warships. iran was sending more weapons including missiles to iraq, syria and yemen. iranian missile, ethel's are among the 5,000 deployed to iraq and 60,000 to point to the east. the pentagon is currently weighing a lot smaller number, and we will await president trump's decision. >>

what has the pentagon said about these air strikes? this is a significant development.y linked to the iranians revolutionary guard. the penchant they went after this his brother organisation in five locations, three in iraq and two in syria. —— the pentagon. they say they went after command and control centres and weapons storage sites. the aim was to deter this organisation and limit the ability to act. the background is that the americans and their bases in iraq have been coming under a series of attacks on the last six weeks or more. the us secretary of state came out and warned that if the attacks continued there would be a firm response. two days ago there was a serious attack on a base where americans warehoused near the city of krkic, 30 rockets were coming down and one undertaking civilian contractor was killed and several servicemen winded. this seems to be a direct response to that, hitting the organisation the americans blame for carrying out the attacks on their personnel in iraq. what can we expect to happen next? this is a very tense time i would say for a

the pentagon has tried to build strong partnerships, especially throughout west africa because the pentagon is trying to identify or america is trying to identify real partners across the continent in the last decade since they opened up africa command, to do just that, to carry out the global war on terror. >> what's the thinking behind the reported drawdown from the pilgd r pentagon's perspective? >> the drawdown is about this idea of great power competition. after trump came to office and the last three secretaries have signed on, it's more important that the military focus attention some would say back to china and russia, the great powe powers, and a little less on counterterrorism. so much attention to iraq and afghanistan after 9/11, that it's due. mark esper has tried to get the ball rolling after shanahan wasn't moving much on it. we had a couple weeks ago from the "wall street journal" they were considering a drawdown in afghanistan of a few thousand troops, up to 4,000 or maybe higher. now we're hearing this out of -- not just africa but deep down in the report, also latin americ

the pentagon a suspended the training of all saudi arabia military students in the u.s. following an attack by a saudi air force officer at an air base in florida last week in which 3 people were killed. the white house says donald trump has again walled russia not to interfere in u.s. elections sergey lavrov the russian foreign minister is in washington for talks and this is his 1st visit to the u.s. since 27 teens level off says claims of russian meddling in the 2016 election are baseless and moscow wants to normalize relations. appeared at the international court of justice to defend her country against allegations of genocide the accusations stem from the 2017 military crackdown against muslims which forced almost a 1000000 people to flee to neighboring bangladesh. volcanic activity has significantly increased on new zealand's white island in what could be a blow to for efforts to recover the 8 people missing believed dead it erupted on monday killing at least 6 people 30 others are in hospital and 25 of them are in critical condition argentina's new president albert

person after the shooting the governor of florida said it was terrorism and urged the pentagon to do a better job of screening for newer terry students they're doing a big review about how all this stuff is done in terms of the vetting my sense is that more needs to be done over the weekend the defense secretary signaled a review was considered anybody that comes to united states to train is or should be. it's vetted by the department state department homeland security and ultimately us there are more than 5000 military personnel from more than 150 different countries currently in the u.s. and various bases throughout the country doing training it's a military exchange that's been going on for many years now but since the shooter was from saudi arabia it's now saudi military personnel that are being closely scrutinized gabriel zonda oh how does it or washington. and the saudi diplomats who headed the kingdom's istanbul consulate where journalist jamal khashoggi was murdered has been barred from entering the u.s. mohammed al of tybee is accused of human rights 5 violations over the ki

in the pentagon and i wanted to see undersecretary difference the idea is that wolfowitz shared with me in charge or cheney in $9192.00. retooled went to the white house briefed people like president america needs a new strategy. so here's an idea springs. i went through the pentagon in november of 2001 and one of the general said sure i got this memo on. we're going to go after 7 countries in 5 years. i said is that a classified memo to your. start with iraq and then we're going to move to syria lebanon libya somalia sudan and iran. i think it's highly probable the administration has already made the decision to go to war against iran there are already u.s. troops inside iran who want to repeat that there are already u.s. troops inside iran the u.s. has long had its eyes set on trying to impact regime change in iran and much of what you've seen the u.s. doing with regards to iran has been on a covert level we've seen a report in new yorker by seymour hersh that a u.s. source told him that u.s. marines were operating in the blue key missouri and kurdish regions of iran have you ever

finally, the pentagon on it is going to get the attention that it's deserved. apparently this other things going on on the hill, but we want to welcome you and thank you for your on record public service, but also for you're making sure that the auto nobility of the d.o.t. is a top priority. the fact that all federal agencies were mandated to do audits beginning in 1990 and the d.o.t. has been the last to get in line is well, so much so that the nda and i believe 2015 has committed and said, okay, you've had enough, time you want to make this happen, and i was ratified to be part of the committee when we finally gave the ultimatum and ratified under your leadership the d.o.t. is moving to get this done. last week, the department announced officially failed the 2019 audit. that is not surprising. i think actually would've found a great deal of skepticism on this committee on the 2019 report saying, everything is fine, when you start something as complex as this, if you are not finding the areas to improve, failings that need to be corrected, that will be policym

fewer troops could spend next christmas at the pentagon with a decision to pull 4000 troops out. even more from other hot spots. >> i'm looking at south com, places i can free up troops, bring them home allow them to rest, refit and retrain and reallocate to compete with the chinese. >> with at least 7000 deployed to africa. there is not many troops to cut. ahead of u.s. forces in africa pentagon secure conference room known as the tank, no final decision were made. u.s. forces launched a record number of drone psychs in somalia. at the pentagon lucas tomlinson fox news. >>> proposal to release student debt for thousands of americans, the plan by a republican lawmaker. >>> unbelievable site at a sacramento mall, when a group of men threw dollar bills from a walkway. ahoyy! (excited squeal, giggling, panting) gotcha! ah! nooooo... noooooo... nooooo... quick, the quicker picker upper! bounty picks up messes quicker and is 2x more absorbent than the leading ordinary brand. ahoy! (laughing) bounty, the quicker picker upper. >>> a break in the case involving the stabbing death of a ma

both mark sandy and a pentagon official involved in discussions at the time testified to congress that they repeatedly expressed their legal concerns to duffey and urged him to talk to the general counsel, the lawyer, because they thought they were breaking the law. mark sandy also testified the two budget officials quit their jobs over their concerns about the legality of what they were doing, specifically over potential violations of the impoundment control act. now, your level of excitement about the congressional budget and impoundment control act of 1974 may vary. it is decidedly an unsexy title, but what's astounding here is, a, this new evidence corroborates the evidence that trump officials knew they were doing something wrong and quite possibly something illegal, and they were trying to keep this scheme quiet while ignoring warnings from career officials across the government. and b, we are continuing to get new evidence. michael duffey is already one of the four administration officials who senate leader chuck schumer has proposed as a witness. he said these emails show the s

the pentagon now concerned about security risks involving those popular at-home genetic tests, telling military personnel to avoid them the threat that keeps these search-and-rescue teams up at night. >> this is something we train for this is something realistically, we have to be ready for. >> as we go inside a new training exercise to help first responders deal with the potential underground terrorist attack beneath our cities. >>> plus, there's still time tips to get those last-minute gifts under the tree >> announcer: this is "nbc nightly news" with lester holt >>> good evening millions of americans on the move, or at least trying to, tonight, at the start of this christmas week bad weather in the southeast, a deluge of rain got things off to a bad start for some air travelers in florida, with a record 115 million americans expected to travel over this holiday stretch, airports across the country are bracing for a crush of passengers and highway travel will likely be a challenge, too kerry sanders is in florida for us tonight. >> reporter: ft. lauderdale's airport back in business

i trust the jobs that you guys do, and i trust a lot of people at the pentagon. they are important, not just throwing it out there, so i would like to learn more about how that works. there was recently a discussion of aid being approved for lebanon. that ate was held up for some period of time, when we attempted to find out why it was hard, basically. it was eventually released, but we never really heard what was the point. those sorts of things really matter. i think they matter for the executive branch but there are a lot of, people who are just policymakers wanting to be part of the discussion to help, as a coequal branch of government or towards a good policy. lastly, certainly isis is a huge concern in the region but there are other concerns. we want to know how the policies is dealing with syria. with bosher assad having held on to power and seemingly will for quite some time. how does that impact the broader region? i personally just got back from a trip to the middle east, and while there are certainly challenges, there are opportunities there. there are

how does the president's intervention play at the pentagon?of command? >> katy, it's such an interesting question, because you've got to remember first that when trump came into office, the pentagon was pretty happy about it. this is kind of a constituency that leans to the right anyway and is right in his wheel house. and he said he came into office the first year as president, loosening up a lot of the controls, the strict controls that president obama had on generals out in the field. he also put more money into the military. so the pentagon saw a lot of their budget -- they saw their budget increase. so people were happy at first. that's really turned in the last couple of years, and in particular, the last year. there are two things that have happened in the last two months. not just the eddie gallagher and the pardoning of those three -- those three people that he did a week and a half ago, which really has really alienated a lot of the senior leadership at the pentagon, but in addition to that, president trump's decision to abandon the

i was in the pentagon and i wanted to see your new secretary or france 90 years.wolfowitz shared with me in charge or at cheney in $9011000.00. retooling about him went to the white house briefed people like presidents america needs a new strategy or force regime change. so there's this idea springs back up again in 2001. i went through the pentagon in november of 2001 and one of the general said sure i got this memo on it's. going to go after 7 countries in 5 years. i said is that a classified memo he said to her. start with iraq and then we're going to move to syria lebanon libya somalia sudan and iran. i think it's highly probable the administration has already made the decision to go to war against iran there are already u.s. troops inside.

i went through the pentagon in.

iraq and syria killing 25 retaliation for a rocket attack that killed an american contractor the pentagon blames a rain in fact missed and prepared. and as the year draws to closer we begin our review of the key events that shaped 1900 violent street protests that seem to grip every corner of the. hello good morning just on 9 o'clock here in moscow you with r.t. international. has personally thank donald trump for a tipoff from u.s. intelligence which helped foil a terrorist plot in simply to get more details now from detail he's following the story course here despite all the differences between the 2 countries it does seem there is at least common ground when it comes to fighting terrorism. well just to give you some background to this russia's federal security service that is the f.s.b. announced on friday 2 russian citizens who were planning on committing terrorist attacks on home soil was arrested it is said that the incident was going to take place in some widely called the country's 2nd capital often called the venice of the north because of its canals and it was going to take plac

newly released e-mails showing the office of management, you know them as the omb asked the pentagon to freeze aid to ukraine on the same day president trump asks president zelensky to do him a favor. pete buttigieg is taking both sides from the party. mayor pete is just not experienced enough for the white house. overseas, north korea expanded a factory associated with the production of nuclear missiles according to the analysis of photos provided to nbc. the revelation is fuelling concer concerns. we'll begin today with the latest on the impeachment inquiry. here is what's happening now. the office of management and budget advised the pentagon to holdup aid to ukraine on the same day president trump asked ukrainian president zelensky to do us a favor, investigate the 2016 elections and former vice president joe biden and his son hunter. rudy giuliani is promoting baseless conspiracy theories, debunked storied otherwise known as lies about joe biden. and ambassador yovanovitch committing perjury. mitch mcconnell says he hopes nancy pelosi will send impeachment articles to the senate

the pentagon as you know we just reported is sending 100 u.s.ines and two apache helicopters to the embassy in baghdad. their obvious mission is to bolster security. will that be enough considering the escalating tensions? >> that's the big question. we want to make sure we are responding correctly that obviously our primary concern in this immediate moment is the scaft and security of the americans located there. and then we want to make sure this doesn't escalate. nobody wants a war with the iranian government. we certainly don't want increased chaos in iraq. we want security and stability in that country. we want iraq to have a stable sovereign nation. and so, we need to be careful that we are doing everything necessary, the american government, our american military can overwhelm anything that the iranian government and their militias can do. we know that but we don't want to go that route and so if the iranian government that needs to stop this messaging that the problem is iraq. the problem is them. and they need to call off these protests

looking back on that year, how would you characterize it for the defense department and pentagon? i would like to hear from both of you how you look at the year and the roles you inherited in that past year. secretary esper: i can't escape him and he can't escape me. >> i'm deeply honored that i was confirmed and chief of staff of the army and focusing on the army's business and a month or two in preparation for this job. had a very long professional and personal relationship with neral dunford and we did a rofessional handoff. secretary esper: i had great pleasure working with chairman dunford before i assumed this position and after and the transition has been seamless and after having a lot of time together. i think we have strong teams across the department now. and last night we got three more senior d.o.d. officials confirmed and more in the pipeline in various pieces. but the constant churn, it happens. these are demanding jobs and burn people out very quickly. we have a strong team. happy with the commanders we have out in the field as well. everything looks good. >> i wan

the pentagon claims they were lost.al witnesses said they were with and exchanged fire the pdf headquarters, wounding a soldier and civilians. >> an american serviceman has been killed. >> an example of general noriega 's cruelty. americanath of an officer which president bush condemned today. >> a navy officer and his wife were detained. he beaten and threatened with death. servicemen, threatening that man's wife. strong support for a reprisal was all but guaranteed. four days later on december 20, u.s. troops invaded panama. the invasion was code-named operation just cause. shortly after midnight, u.s. troops simultaneously attacked 27 targets, many of which were in densely populated areas. one of the primary targets in panama city was the headquarters of the panamanian defense forces, located in the crowded neighborhood of el chorillo. u.s. troops shelled the area for four hours before moving in and calling for surrender. >> we ask you to surrender. if you do not, we are prepared to level each and every building. sur