remember a shut down because they want to spend more money and not offset by spending cuts. do you support the president shutting down the government until he gets the $5 billion for the border wall? i ve never been a fan of saying we re going to shut it down purposely, but i m also not a fan that we re keeping it open and bankrupting the country. this year the did he have stit will be about $1 trillion. i don t want to add more money. the bill they ve got up there already looks like a christmas tree with all things added. i m not against border wall funding. right now we re spending $50 billion a year in afghanistan. we could easily find $5 billion for a wall if we weren t spending so much money building and rebuilding afghanistan. it s clear the president went against the advice of his defense secretary, top official leading the fight against isis, brett mcgurk and john bolton when making the decision to withdraw troops from syria. you obviously support this policy. did you talk
well, we ve got 28,000 troops on the dmz between south and north korea. they re not in harm s way but they re still there. in syria, this was a low-cost situation for us to continue to route out syria, to route out isis but also to keep in check what s happening there with russia and iran. and the fact is, we were coming to a close at some point, obviously. we were going to leave syria. but to leave it when you re within a couple of months of doing something that is very important in the fight against isis and the president knows that, and we pull jerk the rug out from under two months in advance, that s hard to understand. as it relates to afghanistan, no doubt. we made a lot of mistakes there. a lot of resources went to iraq.
i ve seen it. yes, we ve been there a long time. there are ways of leaving and, again, this is precipitous. it appears to me that some changes are taking place, as the way we re looking at afghanistan and, yes, we re negotiating with the very people that we went there to take out. so, i understand the frustrations with afghanistan. i do. i do not understand i have no understanding of what we did why we did what we did in syria. it just totally boggles any sane thinking that could take place. boggles it. i don t understand it. you were at the white house wednesday after the president ma made the announcement to exit from syria. before you could speak to the president he canceled the meeting. what happened there? i don t know. i think he had no public events that day. i think, obviously, our conversation had evolved to be it was going to be all about syria and i just don t think that was a topic on that
combating isis, john allen, told me and i want to get your response. we all thought at one point they would come home. a precipitous departure of our troops could create a military disaster and global coalition will think twice about coming to help the united states if we need to in a great emergency because they know we won t consult with them when the time comes. you re always talking about the importances of alliances and diplomacy. don t you think the way this is being done without the consultation of allies could go ahead. here is the thing, jake. you get these generals, if we bring troops home from afghanistan, that s precipitous also. we ve been there 17 years. how does it become precipitous to leave after 17 years? the president said when we went into syria, very clearly, we re going to defeat isis. that was our goal. then all those people who believe in forever war changed the goal pest and changed the mission and says we re going
yes, we ve been there a long time. there are ways of leaving and, again, this is precipitous. it appears to me that some changes are taking place, as the way we re looking at afghanistan and, yes, we re negotiating with the very people that we went there to take out. so, i understand the frustrations with afghanistan. i do. i do not understand i have no understanding of what we did why we did what we did in syria. it just totally boggles any sane thinking that could take place. boggles it. i don t understand it. you were at the white house wednesday after the president made the announcement to exit from syria. before you could speak to the president he canceled the meeting. what happened there? i don t know. i think he had no public events that day. i think, obviously, our conversation had evolved to be it was going to be all about syria and i just don t think that was a topic on that day i think he knows that he has made a mistake.