The most extreme, of course, was the assassination that he ultimately decided to initiate. But the president made that decision to go forward. It was a bold choice. It was something that president bush and president obama did not decide to do because it was seen as too provocative. But trump surprised military leaders in choosing to go forward and assassinating the top iranian general and there are disagreements within the administration about how strategic this was. How sort of thought through the next steps might be dealing with the likely retaliation from iran and then what next. Its a bit risky. Also, by the way, reporting about some uncertainty about the u. S. Intelligence regarding the general. Regarding what sort of actions he had been plotting and planning and how serious those were. And that is likely to be the center of a lot of political debate here in washington in the days to come. Sort of what exactly was the intelligence that the president was presented before he made th
Waited on. Welcome to our viewers in the United States and around the world. This is early start. Im laura jarett. Thrilled to be here. Its 4 00 a. M. In new york. And its 32 days until the iowa caucuses. After days of violent fprotest y iranbacked demonstrators at the embassy in baghdad. Thousands of angry supporters of an iranbacked militia tried to storm the embassy. They were protesting deadly u. S. Air strikes launched in response to the death of a u. S. Contractor in a rocket attack. The protesters did damage inside the embassy. Some of the rooms were left charred there. Iraqi Security Forces have regained control of the every ya. But a spokesperson for the group that organized the demonstration said america should have received the message. The embassy says all Consul Services are suspended until further notice. Arwa damon is live for us in baghd baghdad. Arwa . Reporter good morning. And what that group is saying, hezboll hezbollah, is these protests are openended. They have re
New decade. Well take you live to times square where preparations are under way. We begin with breaking news in iraq where hundreds of protesters angry about u. S. Air strikes that killed 25 people over the weekend have stormed the u. S. Embassy in baghdad. The demonstrations turned violent with protesters hurling stones and setting fires which you can see there. While Security Forces and embassy guards fought back with stun grenades and tear gas. A group of demonstrators shouting death to america have broken down the gate leading into the u. S. Compound. President trump responded on twitter, writing, iran killed an american contractor, wounding many. We strongly responded and always will. Now iran is orchestrating an attack on the u. S. Embassy in iraq. They will be held fully responsible. In addition we expect iraq to use its forces to protect the embassy, and so notified. Nbcs hans nichols is in florida traveling with the president , and ali arouzy. Ali, whats the latest . Geoff, th
Meanwhile, President Trump is already putting the blame squarely on iran for the attacks warning that iran will be held fully responsible. Lets get straight to cnns arwa damon. We do know that the u. S. Ambassador is away. He was on vacation. Where do things stand in baghdad right now . Reporter tough to actually get an accurate assessment on that, the latest live images that we saw from the outside of the embassy showed what appeared to be a dwindling crowd, but one that was setting a number of fires, and of course this comes after hours where we saw a significant number of people out front chanting antiamerican slogans, demanding that america leave trying to scale the walls of the embassy to get inside. The iraqi Prime Minister has been trying to calm down the situation, but we have to also look at who this group is that is protesting. These are not ordinary protesters, alex. These are by and large members of whats known as the Popular Mobilization force that is a Paramilitary Force