i interviewed general stanley mcchrystal. mid-level al qaeda are being hit. they don't know why or how this happens. we, as americans, war is changing and we should know more about how it is changing, how we are employing, basically, a deaf strike -- death strike on how that works. it was a great thing coming out of the hearing. tavis: about the pope? >> i got a call just about 6:00 this morning and i turned on the morning america and we were talking about the first time in 600 years. it is remarkable that one of the things is that haute than evict. having them, it is kind of liked the old boss is still there. tavis: syria? >> syria is a huge problem in a number of ways. after the israeli air strike inside syria, those missiles, it is extremely tense in israel. they are worried about retaliation. 60,000 people have died and no one can come up with a solution. there is fragmentation out. this is a crisis that has not been resolved. tavis: martha raddatz, thank you for coming on. >> i am thrilled, thank you so much. tavis: up next, a look at the documentary ver

please join me in welcoming general stanley mcchrystal to brookings. [applause] >> thank you for coming. it is a privilege to be on the platform with you. thank you for that very generous introduction. we are going to have a conversation for the first half or so of the hour and a half that we have. i will ask the general a bunch of questions. at about 10:45, maybe later, we will open it up to questions from you. it is an honor to have you here today. this is the maiden voyage of the brookings intelligence project. the brookings intelligence project is a new effort to try to resolve the riddle of intelligence successes and failures, the enigma of why intelligence is sometimes brilliantly successful and other times spectacular failures. one of the great successes is behind the hunt for zarqawi. why should we care about a dead jordanian? zarqawi's legacy remains with us today. the terrorists who this month attacked a natural gas facility in algeria, al qaeda and the islamic -- they almost worship of -- worship abu musab al- zarqawi. he is a more popular i

a reality we seldom see, says stanley mcchrystal, the retired general who once ran the military's drone strike program. >> if we are too casual about it, then we will forget how much scar tissue we build up in those countries. >> reporter: the general believes that americans should have the opportunity to know more about these secret drone wars, to weigh those benefits and risks. that rare opportunity will occur tomorrow, when john brennan speaks, diane. >> it is going to be a very combustive day. thank you, martha raddatz. >>> and also today, a more trusted part of american life has succumbed to modern times. the postal service announced today that saturday delivery of letters will soon end in august. only packages will come to your door. and abc's ron claiborne tells us about the surprising ways this will effect everyone. >> reporter: a $15 billion plus budget deficit has done what neither rain nor sleet nor snow could do. >> the choice is either change some of the service or raise prices. and people don't want prices raised. we'll make the changes in service. >> hello. >> how are you

offered up a really great solution to the problem reinstate the draft pick up former general stanley mcchrystal the man responsible for the failed troop surge in afghanistan said this in a recent interview with foreign affairs that america suffers right now from the fact that many americans don't meet or deal with anybody outside their social or cultural circle i think mandatory national service would have a huge effect to help us in that direction wow that makes complete sense let's force people to be mindless robots of working on behalf of the military industrial complex in order to become cultured crystal the idea of meeting people outside of our cultural circles is forcing the barrel of a gun in their faces and bombing their foreign lands i'm sure that the best way to learn about the world is traveling with the most brainwashed gene go with stick attitude of american exceptionalism nothing more inviting camouflage in a semi-automatic rifle whatever happens. studying abroad learning other languages doing piecework or simply reading it's amazing what you can learn about the world from reading

preview of what is to come on her show kicking off in thirty minutes abby so you know general stanley mcchrystal general the former general his idea for getting more cultured and learn about the world guess what it is i don't know he wants to instill the draft he says that going over the barrel of a gun will help us learn about other cultures of the worlds we're talking about this outrageous statement he made along with of course the news of the day monsanto's court case it was a pretty court versus the indiana farmer that much more check out break in the next thirty minutes thanks for that update out there but that is going to do it for the news now from around the stories we covered you can always check out our you tube channel you tube dot com slash r t america our web site r t dot com slash usa and you can fall.

. >> bill, well, we've had people like stanley mcchrystal, former general mcchrystal, the problem usinghe drone strikes to the extent, 300 plus now, is that they actually cause an enormous amount of, you know, people are resentful overseas because of the collateral damage and obviously, there is collateral damage during war time and people know that. for obama, i'm going to get rid of gitmo, get rid of gitmo and outstretch our hand and you're going to unclench your fist and the world is a better place. mcchrystal says we've got to be careful, if that's one of obama's goals, new america, new approach, it's not bush, and especially when used against american citizens which we haven't talked about, this has all sorts of other repercussions in the middle east. >> bill: the consequences and they're going to hate us anyway. i support the drone program. >> do you support them against american citizens. >> bill: yeah, working with al-qaeda. blow the hell out of them. >> how about the standards imminent, the shifting definition of an imminent threats. >> bill: all right, next, i've got to run no

now retired general stanley mcchrystal. [applause] >> well, thank you very much. thanks for coming out. i think this is a wonderful opportunity for the gentleman sitting next to me is kind of a big deal. for anyone who is, pays attention to american foreign policy and military affairs you know that ever since the attacks on this country on 9/11 the united states has had to evolve militarily, in our intelligence community in many ways to meet the challenge of this new enemy. and more than anyone that i can think of general mcchrystal has been responsible for shaping that evolution and developing the, what i call the targeting engine which is what we have, i think adopted as our primary method of defending the country. so thank you for being here, general mcchrystal. great to see you. >> thanks, mark. thanks for a too kind introduction. i always thought of you as a nonfiction writer but you're free to go into fiction now. >> i know that, you were the commander of our special operations in iraq and afghanistan and there has been, as i mentioned a rapid evolution. i'm

friday, february 8th, former commander in afghanistan retired general stanley mcchrystal will address memoir on the afghanistan war and his removal by president obama. the aspen institute is at 1 dupont circle. that is your capital rundown for the week of february 4th, 2013. you can find more on www.myfoxdc.com and reach us on twitter with #capitalrundown. i'm tom fitzgerald. we'll see you next week. ere 24. oh dear, i got a flat tire. hmmm. uh... yeah, can you find a take where it's a bit more dramatic on that last line, yeah? yeah i got it right here. someone help me!!! i have a flat tire!!! well it's good... good for me. what do you think? geico. fifteen minutes could save you fifteen percent or more on car insurance. delicious. but say i press a few out flat... add some beef sloppy joe sauce... and cheese fold it all up and boom! i just made an unbeatable unsloppy joe pillsbury grands biscuits. let the making begin. [ female announcer ] in just 60 seconds, you can't get more italian. it's on. let's roll. >>> super bowl sunday is almost here. even if you're not into the game, chanc

shootings are semiautomatic military-style weapons and on your very show a couple of weeks ago, stanley mcchrystalrystal said the weapons are made for wars and the rounds they fire are made to destroy the enemy. if we showed pictures of those 20 kids killed with the .223 caliber bushmaster, it would change the equation because even the congress people who are sort of bought and sold by the nra couldn't ignore that horror. so we need what the president is calling for. i mean, our state of massachusetts like minneapolis has proven this isn't a theoretical issue. this is how do you reduce injuries and deaths of guns without banning civilian weapons and you do it by universal background checks, a ban on military-style weapons and high capacity ammunition clips. >> you have the democratic mayor of minneapolis rybak earlier today going after harry reid for saying he had not read feinstein's bill and did not support the assault weapons bill. let's listen in. john, thanks for sticking around. >> well, it is good to be back in minnesota. it is good to be back. i was commenting that they don't really have w

at 9:00 eastern retired general stanley mcchrystal accounts his career followed by our weekly afterwards program. this week jonathan lash discusses population him probation. . we conclude prime-time programming at 11:00 eastern with taylor branch, his most recent book the for the multi volume set about america in the king years focuses on key moments in the civil-rights movement. visit booktv.org for more on this

here is what stanley mcchrystal, the former commander of forces in afghanistan, told reuters last month. quote, the resentment created by american use of unmanned strikes is much greater than the average american appreciates. they are hated on a visceral level, even by people who have never seen one or seen the effects of one. another point, in "the l.a. times" today, columnist carol williams wrote, quote, imagine if north korea or iran or venezuela deployed thousands of unmanned surveillance aircraft in search of earthbound enemies, a swarm of robotic hunters armed with lethal weaponry and their government's go-head to exterminate targets. are either of those a convincing argument for you? >> there are supposedly 70 countries that have some kind of drone technology. but the drone is the instrument of the 21st century when it comes to air power, and that's a reality. the problem comes down to really the morality, and the white house has put out three criteria, including is it an imminent threat? if it were delayed, would it cause greater risk? and is there no other alternative? the prob

eastern with stanley mcchrystal and then fred kaplan, david petraeus, also jeffrey engel discusses a collection of essays on the goal for. >> the economy is at china basin is communism in name only these days. it's to preserve the power of the members of the communist party. but they basically threw most of the ideology aside when deng xiaoping opened the country up and is now a capitalist haven. the communism in china, they talk the talk at great length of these party congresses about marxism, leninism, to do. it's all about preserving the party power economic as a country continues to grow because they threw aside the most vestiges of common is alongside the in north korea it's all about preserving the power of the military and the kim dynasty as you have there. and again, it really has nothing to do with i think what karl marx envisioned as communism way back. someone to do a thousand bucks a model on how communism when it moved into a should diverge into something different in vietnam, cambodia, laos, china and north korea than the communism that appear in europe and eastern euro

and other people, a, because of american values, even stanley mcchrystal has said this. >> i read his book. it's a good book. >> rose: all right. do you agree with his position? >> no. >> rose: and when we say "enhanced interrogation" why don't we call it what many people believe it ought to be called, torture. >> because it's not. >> rose: what's the difference? >> the difference is we went through a very long, difficult, and elaborate process with the justice department before we started the enhanced interrogation programs, we said "tell us where the red line is." at the agency as we were dealing with the need to find ways to get more intelligence from the people that we're capturing, the conclusion was we needed to be able to use more aggressive techniques. but nobody wanted to use techniques that put us over the line into the area of torture because of the international convention against torture. so we spent a lot of time working between the agency professionals and the office of legal counsel and the justice department saying you know, tell us how far we can go. we got approval

. >> bill, what we have also had people like stanley mcchrystal's former general mcchrystal say the problemthese drone strikes, to the extent that we are using them, 300 plus now, is that they actually cause an enormous amount of, you know, people are resentful overseas because of all the collateral damage and obviously there was collateral damage during war time, everybody knows that. but for obama, he he came into office, get rid of gitmo. getting rid of gitmo. unstretch hand and unclinch first and world is going to be a better place. mcchrystal's point is we have to be very careful here. if that's one of obama's goals. new america, new approach it's not bush. then essentially when used against american citizens, which we haven't talked about, this has all sorts of other repercussions in the middle east. bill till it has unintended consequences. i support the drone program. i do. >> do you support them against american citizens. >> bill: if they are working with al qaeda. >> how about the standards they have, bill? the standards imminent is the shifting definition of imminent threat. >> b

. >> general stanley mcchrystal speaking on "morning joe" here on msnbc last month.al was the commander of forces in afghanistan until he resigned back in 2010 after michael hastings' profile of him in "rolling stone" that was so controversial. last month general mcchrystal put out his own book and started doing the interview rounds to promote it. but anybody booked to talk about anything in america in early january 2013 was going to end up talking about gun violence. because of what happened at sandy hook, the elementary school massacre at newtown. even retired military commanders were asked to weigh in, and they had something to say about it. well, today that happened at a whole another level. >> i know. i know what guns can do. >> guns in the right hands protect us. >> guns belong on battlefields. >> guns belong in a place that is safe and secure. >> assault weapons are weapons of war. >> not for cowards to use. >> in movie theaters. >> in classrooms. >> or on our streets. >> as a general. >> as an admiral. >> as a member of the armed force. >> as a gunowner, i de

to katrina's point, stanley mcchrystal in aan interview with reuters said what scares me about dronetrikes is how they are perceived around the world. the resentment created by american use of unmanned strikes is more than the average american can appreciate. >> we're not there and feeling it in a visceral way. the other strange thing, we did a discover story on drones last week, and one sdeelt that sticks in my head is even though the drones are so remote, there is still burn-out suffered by people who operate them even on safe u.s. terrain. it is not without its sort of moral residue even at home by the people who are participating in this program, and i think that's worth thinking about. >> just to go back to both david's points and katrina's, we were talking earlier about the legal at. when the legal standards for targeting american citizens are so loose, what are the standards that are being applied to nonstandards, non-citizens. that has to be a real concern. so far we know of four u.s. citizens who have been killed as a result of targeted killing strikes. robert, who is a form

." >> stanley mcchrystal retired from the army in 2010. the former commander has written a memoir. he talks about his book in the library in philadelphia in january. this is one hour. [applause] >> thank you very much. thank you for coming out. i think it is a wonderful opportunity for the gentleman sitting next to me. and it's kind of a great deal. for anyone who is paying attention to american foreign policy and military affairs, you know that ever since the attacks on 9/11, the united states has had to evolve militarily and in our intelligence community to meet the challenge of this new enemy. more than anyone that i can think of, general mcchrystal has been responsible for shaping that evolution and developing what i call the targeting engine, which is what i think we have adopted as our primary method of defending the country. thank you for being here, general mcchrystal. it is great to see you. >> i know that you are the commander of our special operations in iraq and afghanistan. and there has been, as i mentioned, a rapid evolution. i am familiar from writing black hawk dow

general stanley mcchrystal, the commander of u.s. forces in afghanistan, is not someone who is soft on terrorism. he has raised concerns about his view that the widespread use of drones is raising what he calls a visceral hatred in the big parts of the world. the united states has a big interest in winning over the hearts and minds of those people. because of the drones, they are turning against us. it is kind of a short-term solution that seems easy. the long-term problems may be costly for the united states. they may be causing harm that we will have to deal with for years to come. host: next up is jane on our line for republicans. caller: mr. anders took by words away when he said it is too easy. what is happening with this is in gives too much power to the president and the people he appoints. they are not elected people. this is something that should go through congress. when you go to kill someone without a trial, i do not care is it is an enemy combatants or an american citizen, there should be some form of bipartisan scrutiny

has echoas gl stanley mcchrystal has echoed a new level we can't begin to imagine.eater than the average american appreciates. well, i think we appreciated that we want to have this become the first of a number of hearings. i conclude by saying i don't think that the attorney general of the united states can decline to come before this committee on a subject that is so clearly within our jurisdiction. mr. chairman, i got back my time. >> i thank the gentleman for that expression of concern. i share it and i will work with members on his side of the aisle and our side of the isle to bring about better cooperation because we are seeking information that this committee is entitled to have. we have a very distinguished panel -- without objection, all numbers have been the fitness be made part of the record that we will turn to our panel. we have a distinguished panel joining us now begin by introducing the witnesses. our first is mr. john bellinger, a personal ad is offered in washington d.c. where he advises sovereign governments in u.s. foreign companies and a variety

and now general stanley mcchrystal discusses his book "my share of the task" with co-author mark bowden. former commander of u.s. forces recounts the major turning point in his thirty-four year military career which ended in 2010. this is about an hour. [applause] >> thank you very much, thanks for coming out. wonderful opportunity, the gentleman sitting next to me is kind of a big deal. for anyone who is -- pays attention to american foreign policy and military affairs you know that ever since the attacks on this country on 9/11 the united states has had to evolve militarily and in the intelligence community to meet the challenge of this new enemy and more than anyone i can think of, general mcchrystal has been responsible for shaping the evolution and developing what i call the targeting engine which is what we adopted as the primary method of defending the country. thank you for being here, great to see you. >> thanks for two kind introduction. i thought of you as a nonfiction writer but you have gone into fiction now. >> you were the commander of special operations in iraq and afgha

and then you go talk with petraeus or stanley mcchrystal, and you say, well, this guy's a smart guy.he knows history, he understands strategy, he thinks strategically g you're inclined to think, well, you know, maybe he knows what he's doing here. so you give him a break, and then you get some -- you know, it's the trade-offs that go with sources and the people if washington. so, and, you know, it's this kind of thing, you know what he's doing and you knew what he was doing, but you kind of went with it anyway because it was interesting and useful for both sides. what he thinks of the book? i don't know. when he merges from his exile, somebody should ask him. >> you just mentioned hagel. is he going to get confirmed, or is the senate going to block that? >> well, um, i think he's probably going to get confirmed. i mean, i watched a little bit of the hearings today, and, you know, it's a handful -- it's several republicans who don't like him. but let's parse this. i mean, the two things substantively that people, that his critics are bothered by are the fact that he didn't support the