concern in your mind deploying troops to saudi arabia in the wake of all of this? >> no. not at all. i think saudi arabia's a long-standing partner of ours in the region. we share mutual security interests primarily with regard to iran and the importance of there is reassuring our neighbors and allies throughout the region that we're there to assist them, we're there to defend the rule international rs based ordernd a we need to deter iran from its maligned behavior. >> there are multiple reports about additional forces heading to the middle east to counter iran. is that happening? no. those are false reports. i don't know where they came from. we've deployed 14,000 troops since may of this year but right now i'm not looking at any new year's day major deployments coming up in the region. that said, on a day-to-day basis we monitor what's happening in the middle east, on the korean peninsula, the european theater