Of Angela Merkel in germany and theresa may in britain who praised the move and said it was right an humanitarian thing to do. We have the meeting the president is talking with his chinese counterpart talking about thorny economic issues. He left open the possibility that could include the north korean issue. Blake burman is there keeping track of breaking developments. Reporter neil, actually a couple things. He stuck to the script as it relates to china. Of course the president is here at maralago for his meeting with the chinese president , xi xinping. They will, afterc wrapping up e bilateral a little while ago, have a working lunch. It will be the end of a visit between the two leaders. No mention from that message with the president about syria. No mention about north korea. The president somewhat sticking to the script there, essentially trying to declare Mission Accomplished as it relates to this chinese visit. Going in Administration Officials were telling us, dont expect any grand compromises or any sort of a grand bargain. Rather they want to establish a framework and working relationship for these go leaders and two governments moving forward. The president says he feels a lot of quote, potentially bad problems as it relates to china, i. E. , trade and north korea would be going away. But the president also said he feels they have struck a Good Relationship between the two leaders and the two countries. The backdrop of all of this though, neil as weve seen last 24 hours, syria no comment there from the president. We do expect this to come to the forefront throughout the rest of the day. Want to show you one quick picture as it happened last night, getting a little glimpse how this all went down last night, the president surrou by members of his team, his closest advisors, hr mcmass tar, the National Security advisor and steve bannon and gary cohn as the strike took place in the 9 00 hour. So as it stands on the noon hour from palm beach across the water at maralago, the president expected to wrap up his meeting with xi xinping of china, trade, north korea, other topics appears to be a success the president says, but still syria, something to keep an eye on. Neil . Neil do we know, blake, the backstory how the president notified the chinese president on these tomahawk missile targeted attacks in syria that he apparently, you know, reached over to him, gave him a heads up, went out to speak outside of the maralago resort . How did that all go down . Reporter what we do know he gave the chinese president at least notification i guess we want to put it that way, that this would be happening last night in syria. Keep in mind, xi xinping is, was there on the ground at maralago. They were having dinner. The two sides, the two delegations. We are led to believe that the president told him this would be coming. I do not believe it was a heads up of sorts, a notification, yes indeed what was happening in syria was taking place and that the United States fully behind him, neil. Neil another quick question, you mentioned it before, among those who were listening to the president , one snapshot there of last night, you had bannon there, you had gary cohn, the National Economic council. I noticed in the luncheon today the same principles including steve mnuchin. You have of course the secretary of state but it looks like the entire Economic Team is there and further down, mr. Bannon. Im wondering, read anything into the seat placements there . Reporter well couple of things on this. So they were clearly brought into this matter when youre talking about wilburc ross, gay cohn, steve mnuchin, that is because of the trade component, top fend today items at maralago to take place all of this 24 hour vest it. All of sudden syria gets mixed up into the emitigation and theyre at the table. One thing to note, gary cohn the top Economic Advisor to the president but if you look back at former counterparts of his in other administrations, might have they have been at the table, you almost think that would not have been the case and youre starting to hear stories of gary cohn starting to assert his influence within the administration, starting to move up. You get that picture last night there, neil, gary cohn, front and center seated around the table and you have to wonder where he moves going forward. Neil i read seating very closely. My wife and i would be seated by the band or the loudest airconditioning unit. Thank you very, very much, blake burman in maralago in west palm beach, florida. Those meetings ensued, chris harmer says this is the beginning here in how the president would proceed. Were told, chris this, is oneoff. That is the message we got from the secretary of state. We call these oneoffs theyre rarely oneoffs. What happens now. We have regained credibility with our allies. We regained credibility with our enemies. What you want to go into situation known as no better friend, no worst enemy. The fact we took military action in specific response to chemical weapons attacks reestablishes u. S. Credibility. It makes all of our diplomatic initiatives easier. Im not saying that solve anything or that its a permanent solution but as a positioning element it is helpful in that regard. Neil your 30year expertise, chris, my own kneejerk amateur read of this, much of the world, maybe assad, Vladmir Putin misread President Trump there was impression certainly after the accusations that the russians were actively involved in our election last year and they were very friendly to donald trump, he would certainly do nothing unfriendly to russia. Since he was known and frequent it critic of barack obama and his handling of assad we shouldnt get involved and more to the point we shouldnt try to topple assad that they didnt expect the reaction they got after the learning of this chemical weapons attack. What you do you think . Very directly, i dont do political analysis, i do strategic analysis. Neil so do i. You and i are so alike. That is amazing. Now that president obamas tenure is in the books, fair to say from a strategic prespective primary objective was aggressive nonintervention. He didnt want to get the u. S. Involved. Both russia, iran, syria, had the impression that sort of nonintervention would continue indefinitely since this was relatively small chemical weapons attack. I derstand that the to the victims thereis no small chemical weapons attack. But this is a drop in the bucket compared to all the atrocities. I think this response caught russia and iran offguard. Certainlyc assad offguard. I dont think Bashar Alassad has the knowledge to respond to this. They want to keep a leash on him because they dont want any further u. S. Development. I expect no use of chemical weapons by syria for the foreseeable future. Neil wonder why they used chemical weapons. A traditional attack would not have gotten the endings attention this one did. The reason the assad regime is narrow margins of viability. They lost a lot of military capability to attrition. They lost a lot more due to attrition. Vast majority of Syrian People want assad gone. He has only 15, 20 . That is why iranians pay afghan con vicinities to fight in syria on behalf of assad and shia militia out of iran and iraq. The he uses chemical weapons because he is trying to terrorize his population. Because he just doesnt have the depth of conventional weapons to do what he needs to do anymore. Neil all right, that he, very much, chris, good seeing you. My pleasure, thank you. Neil as he pointed out these things happen after socalled oneoff comment. Fox news learned, were getting confirmation that a russian warship headed into the eastern med train and headed towards two u. S. Navy destroyers including those that launched airstrikes into syria. Former Navy Seal Michael zapata. Welcome to both of you. What do you make of that and the early russian response . Having. Former navy seal, now here in new york, so i appreciate it. When you see ships posturing in the mediterranean i dont think its a surprise. They were expected to posture. They are contingency efforts to counter those and continuation of that over next couple weeks. It will be interesting to see what impacts on the market and our specific investments will be. Neil im looking at it too, paul, wondering what the russians do now because obviously they had hoped and if you believe all the press, they had hoped they would have a friendlier, easier time with donald trump. Now things are off to a kind of a tense footing. Where do you see this going. Obviously each side wants to sort of get and takes maximum advantage of whatever pr they can with Something Like this, what do they do . I think they act very carefully. I do agree with the reports that is is a surprise. I think Donald Trumps comment made some people think he wouldnt do things like this. And then the people around him, congress, et cetera. Now itsis very clear he is who he has always been, a guy who takes charge, he takes action to work his will. The russians under stalin, under brezhnev, crew chef, under everybody, last thing they dont want a war with the United States and they cant win it putin is the weakest with the revolution. He will be very careful to know in back channels, what will you do, what are we allowed to do, that will upset the applecart. I think they will lay low. That frigate was already on its way anyway. They are constantly resupplying toartas, the port in syria. Neil where do they go, at least yourc impression, at least at this stage, michael, you get a sense of it, to all of your kind of analysis here, rarely do things end off in a one off . If youre assad, you have to get clearance or anything from Vladmir Putin, right . So everything is going to be directed at toward Vladmir Putin. Absolutely and putin has proved himself a master, maybe more so with the previoUs Administration, but hes controlling that very heavily. There is an irani infle controlling assad. And assad is going to depend on them for support going forward. So i think it is important to see the posturing, see what theyre going to do. It is also important to point out that President Trump is being tested right now and putin knows to be able to test him out, to see what is going to happen and see the reaction. It is important we establish credibility. It is a good move. To be honest it should have been done four years ago with the original red line. Neil i want to thank you you both. Meantime we havent heard anything beyond what Vladmir Putin is doing, condemning attack that it is unwarrant and provocative. Russian press was telling its people was planned long before socalled chemical attack on Syrian People. That is how it is being spun over there. That is what russians are being told over there. This is the United States acting unilaterally and in their terms savagely. Neil gorsuch is now on his way to the Supreme Court, despite the fact of great disruption over socalled Nuclear Option. He got more votes than Clarence Thomas. That was then. Very different environment now. We now will have a ninth Supreme Court justice. The case is already piling up, after this. Predictable. The comfort in knowing where things are headed. Because as we live longer. And markets continue to rise and fall. Predictable is one thing you need in retirement to help protect what youve earned and ensure it lasts. Introducing brighthouse financial. A new company established by metlife to specialize in annuities life insurance. Talk to your advisor about a brighter financial future. Welcome to holiday inn thank you wait, i have something for you making every stay a special stay. Member always save more at holidayinn. Com ive spent my life planting a sizesix, nonslip shoe into that door. On this side, i want my customers to relax and enjoy themselves. But these days its phones before forks. They want wifi out here. But behind that door, i need a private connection for my business. Wifi pro from comcast business. Public wifi for your customers. Private wifi for your business. Strong and secure. Good for a door. And a network. Comcast business. Built for security. Built for business. Ways wins. Especially in my business. With slow internet from the phone company, you cant keep up. Youre stuck, watching spinning wheels and progress bars until someone else scoops your story. Switch to comcast business. With highspeed internet up to 10 gigabits per second. You wouldnt pick a slow race car. Then why settle for slow internet . Comcast business. Built for speed. Built for business. Neil all right. Not much market i think in the big sense. Look at new york stock exchange. What is going on with the Dow Jones Industrials up 10 and a third points. Snapshots are important at the time theyre shot. Looking at free fall on futures word tomahawk missile attack on syria had begun. They were in free fall. Asian markets were in free fall. They row bounded. Our markets rebound. Gold running to as in terms of a safe haven. Gold soared when both iraq wars commenced. Look at gold right now. Up a little north of a percent. 126the ounce. Look at defense stocks. No surprise they are up. This fits historically what weve seen. Raytheon makes tomahawk missiles. All but one hit desired target. The one that didnt, it was slightly off the target and was blown up in the sky. But obviously, what raytheon has done with these tomohawks since they were last used in the last gulf war was to get them to change their positioning midstream. In other words used to be when they were shot from a ship, that was it, you kept your fingers crossed. Now they can reposition in midstream and hit their target, im told within half an inch. That is pretty wild. Also were getting word now the u. N. Security council is holding a meeting on syria. The russians are expected to condemn the move, this only a day after nikki haley, our ambassador there had been targeting the russians and targeting those at u. N. Not doing more to crack down on syrian human rice abuses, particularly use of chemical weapons in the past. Republican senator mike lee joins us now. Senator, you are among those who are concerned about the president doing this without congressional okay, more to the point, senate okay. Explain your position. My positions the president empowered to act to protect the United States from an imminent threat to american National Security. But that doesnt mean that the president can start a war without going to congress. That doesnt mean the president can engage in a sustained military action without an authorization for the use of military force, or alternatively, a declaration of war. So i look forward neil he didnt declare war. So you dont buy the notion this could be, as i think his secretary of state said, a oneoff . Well, i dont know yet whether it is going to be a oneoff. If its a oneoff that is entirely different issue. If this is part of a sustained action he needs to come to congress. Im sure he will do that, present a plan, a plan for explaining how exactly this affects the American People an makes them safer. And what is exit strategy is, what he wants to accomplish in this. Then, debate that in front of the American People with the peoples elected representatives in congress. Neil you know the argument for against doing what you say, part of a commanderinchiefs role is not to sort of telegraph what he is going to do, and in this case to send an clear unequivocal signal that it is a threat when any leader, in this case assad, is using chemical weapons on his own people because it just means a matter of time before he starts doing so against other people and to consult with you about that and get into the niceties of it is imperilling lives. You say what . Well in the first place i want to be clear that in no circumstances is it okay to ignore the constitution because it might be inconvenient. I will also say in the event that there are National Security issues that cant be aired publicly, those things can be briefed with members about congress behind closed doors in a secure environment so they dont have to be discussed publicly. But again the imminency of it, the security risks associated with airing Public Information doesnt obviate the need for constitutional process. Neil i understand what youre saying, senator. But think differently than a lot of your colleagues, fact of matter sometimes working things through the senate and through the house because it would be different to have to notify the senate it takes a while. Latest dustup over handling the whole gorsuch thing and then, you know on into health care rework and all that, that kind of time isnt on a president s side. What do you think . No, i understand that. That is why there is an understanding, there is some flexibility, built into the constitution that allows neil wasnt that flexability here is what im saying . In other words the president act what is he did on news that chemical weapons were used on Syrian People. That that was all the flexibility that he needed, not to go to war, but to send a clear and strong signal to the guy who perpetrated those inhuman attacks they would not be tolerated . Yes. To the extent that he can connect that with some kind of an imminent threat to american National Security that is entirely he appropriate for the president to act unilaterally. Neil you dont think it is imminent threat to our National Security . Im not saying there was or there wasnt. Members of congress have not been briefed on this. Members of the senate are being briefed in a little while. I look forward to hearing exactly what is behind the decision. Neil but he acte