you can do a very interesting kind of study in terms of the thickness of the so for the status of forces agreement this is what's negotiated between the united states and so whole host nations and it determines. who has access to united states will have what kind of political powers what happens when u.s. soldiers commit crimes in these countries and when you find is that the. entries that have less power or leverage in relationship to united states have much thinner sofas in these cases these countries you'll find that when u.s. soldiers commit crimes they're not held accountable to not know not tried under the law of the host nation other not put into prisons in the host nation often they're just brought out of the country back into the united states were deployed to war zone because as they say boys will be boys nice guys been trained to be more aggressive than so they were aggressive you know. if. you like your like shot up which steroids you know i mean you're working out every day and you've got guns you've got stuff man and so when you leave off the base man i mean you're feeling pretty goo

well, the united states and the afghan government are in the middle of negotiating some kind of agreement. might even be a status of forces, long-term partnership. it would involve u.s. forces in training and advising, you know, kind of intelligence support, counterterrorism missions into 2015 and beyond. is that number going to be 25,000? i don't know. but it wouldn't be nothing. >> wouldn't be a huge surprise. we'll see what the appetite and mood of the american public is around that time if they last even that long. thanks very much, peter. thanks for coming in. >>> cnn gets into damascus, syria now for the first time since the brutal crackdown began. just ahead a sign in the country the syrian government wants you to see. plus a bold new plan to surrender a major battle in the war on drugs. should the federal government stop enforcing marijuana laws? now, we can watch a newspaper, listen to a magazine, curl up with a movie, and see a phone call. now, we can take a classroom anywhere, hold an entire bookstore, and touch the stars. because now...there's this. >>> a brutal government crackdown in syria. cnn makes it insi

the process is simply that we are abiding by the status of forces agreement that will withdraw all -- have us with a drawl the remainder of our troops by the end of this year. we will entertain requests by the iraqi government and we will entertain and it turned -- in terms of discussed requests as far as a new agreement that would obviously be quite different from the one we have now. we intend to fulfill our obligation under that sofa and withdraw all our remaining forces. since the president has come into office, we have withdrawn 100,000 troops from iraq. >> admiral mullin said in april that without an agreement in weeks, soon, we would have to start making irreversible decisions, he said. that means start bringing troops home. >> we have been bringing troops home consistently, and we are moving along according to the existing agreements we have. obviously, we have different needs of discussing with the iraqi government whatever ideas they may have about any other kind of agreement we might reach. for now, we will keep the commitments we have made. no new talkse been given n on so

to ensure that all of them are brought home at the end of the year as agreed to in our status of forces agreement. my friend and colleague from illinois, congresswoman january schakowsky and myself will require the department to provide audit-ready financial requests. this $648 billion budget, $17 billion above last year's budget. it could be cut at least by $75 billion to $100 billion without undermining our troops. as a daughter of a military veteran, i support each and every dollar in this budget for our troops, because they deserve support and economic security. but we should be cutting waste, fraud and abuse out of the pentagon and should cut these cold war weapons systems that have no reason to be developed in this new world of terrorism and when we see ourselves faced with asymmetrical warfare. $648 billion is too much. it's much, too much. we can ensure our national security, protect our troops and re-invest some of these dollars to create jobs at home with a rational defense budget. so we'll never pay down our debt as long as the military budget continues to soar. thank you very much. th

my colleagues to consider my legislation that would require the president to negotiate a status of forces agreement that would clearly prohibit the establishment of permanent bases. mr. speaker, the outgoing defense secretary, mr. gates, says we're seeking joint bases. whether the united states acts as a tenant as opposed to an occupying force. but i don't believe for a minute that the taliban appreciates the subletty of that distinction. as long as there are boots on the ground and not just boots but large installations with american trappings and english language street signs and so forth the more we embolden the very radical forces we're trying to defeat. we're going exactly the wrong direction, mr. speaker. at a moment when the american people are crying out for this military occupation to end, our leaders look as if they're preparing to extend it into perpetuity. at a moment when casualties are a long-term presence -- excuse me -- at a moment when casualties are on the rise, we're preparing for a long-term presence that will further endanger, not protect, americans. we can't afford permanent w

at the end of this year, for example, in compliance with the status of forces agreement, we will conduct withdrawal of our combat forces from iraq and hand over primary responsibility for our ongoing relationship with the department of state in regards to iraq. it remains to be seen whether the iraqi government will ask us to extend our military presence past december 31, but for now we are thoroughly and determinedly preparing our troops to leave. having served as a member of the iraq study group, mr. panetta certainly understands the importance of this transition and will carry it out. as the next secretary of defense, leon panetta will also continue to focus our efforts on fighting terrorism in afghanistan and pakistan. we are facing a critical turning point in our operations. this week, we expect president obama to announce his plan to begin reducing our force levels in afghanistan this summer, a commitment he made in his speech at west point in 2009. along with the reduction in forces, we must sustain the security gains that we have accomplished during the past year and further buil