[Hannah Vaughan Jones, Cnn:] Hello and welcome. I'm Hannah Vaughan Jones, in for Hala Gorani all week. And we are following two major breaking stories for you this hour. Just minutes ago, President Trump outlined his new America first strategy on national security. We will get you the very latest on that. But first, we head over to the U.S. West Coast, where we bring you breaking news out of the U.S. state of Washington. A passenger train is currently dangling over a major highway after derailing on Monday morning, spilling onto the cars below. Authorities say multiple people inside the train were killed. At least 77 people have been taken to hospitals locally. Here is the train conductor's emergency call just after the crash.
[Unidentified Male:] Amtrak 501, emergency, emergency, emergency. We are on the ground. We are on the bridge On the freeway. We need EMS. It looks like they're already starting to show up. Amtrak 501 answering, Hey guys, what happened? We were coming around the corner to take the bridge over I-5 there, right north into Nisqually and we went on the ground. OK. Are you is everybody OK? I'm still figuring that out. We got cars everywhere and down onto the highway. OK. As soon as I know exactly where all my train is, I will let you know.
[Jones:] Terrifying audio there. It all happened about 80 kilometers south of Seattle near a small city called Dupont during the morning rush hour. U.S. President Donald Trump spoke about it in just the last hour.
[Donald Trump , President Of The United States:] Let me begin by expressing our deepest sympathies and most heartfelt prayers for the victims of the train derailment in Washington State. We are closely monitoring the situation and coordinating with local authorities. It is all the more reason why we must start immediately fixing the infrastructure of the United States.
[Jones:] President Trump there. The U.S. Transportation Safety Board is sending a team of 20 people to investigate the crash. We just heard from one official with the NTSB. Take a listen.
[Unidentified Female:] The NTSB is launching a go team to Dupont, Washington, to investigate the derailment of Amtrak train number 501, which occurred this morning. Before I continue, we would like to all express our deepest condolences to the family and friends and all of those affected by this tragic accident. The NTSB team will be led by Ted Turpin, who will serve as investigator in charge. He is accompanied by NTSB staff with expertise in the following areas: operations, mechanical, track, signals, human performance and survival factors. Also accompanying the team are members of the NTSB's Office of Transportation Disaster Assistance or TDA and the Office of Media Relations. This accident meets the criteria of the Rail Passenger Disaster Family Assistance Act. Our TDA specialists are already working closely with officials at the scene locally as well as with Amtrak to assist them in their efforts to support all of those who have been affected by this accident. Several of our investigators on the West Coast will be arriving on scene this afternoon. The rest of our go team expects to arrive at the scene late tonight.
[Jones:] So investigators are on their way. Authorities so far saying that all of the deaths in this crash were contained to the train itself. Paul Vercammen is following the story from our Los Angeles bureau for us. Paul, I know that the details are still very sketchy right now but talk us through what we know about the casualties, the types of injuries they may have and the number of people on this train in the first place. That might give us some idea as to who was hurt.
[Paul Vercammen, Cnn Correspondent:] That's right, Hannah. Well, this was the inaugural run of the 501 Cascades line going from Seattle to Portland. From what we understand, I've heard two numbers here, between 70 and 78 people on board. That might explain what you were talking about earlier when they said 77 were rushed to local medical centers. I have been in touch with some of those medical centers. They say the injuries are
[Vercammen:] a range of things; a lot of fractures. You can understand this because, as you know, there are no seat belts on this train. Also the U.S. Army has jumped in to help start treating people. Madigan Army Center, which has taken in trauma victims from overseas wars, is not too far north to this. And they are treating at least 20 of the patients. They say about half and half; 10 are serious or so and stable and another batch are stable and fair. As for the fatalities, an extremely difficult number for the authorities to nail down right now. They have said multiple. Does that mean multiple, as in three to 10? Not sure yet. One thing though that's clear, this is fascinating. Despite these horrendous pictures, Hannah, they say there have not been any fatalities on the freeway there. That's Interstate 5. They say no one was killed when the train went off the track and hit cars below it. They say the fatalities were all on the train itself. So perhaps a slight bit of silver lining there. And maybe that will keep that number of fatalities in line and lower than originally forecast Hannah.
[Jones:] If that is the case, that would be truly miraculous. Paul, thanks so much. I know you will update as soon as you get any more details about casualties and fatalities in this horrific crash. Paul, thank you. CNN transportation analyst Mary Schiavo is a former inspector general of the U.S. Transportation Department and joins me now. Mary, we have seen horrific images, aerial shots as well of this derailment, audio from inside the train carriage itself. From those initial images and sounds, what's your assessment of what happened here?
[Mary Schiavo, Cnn Transportation Analyst:] Well, because of the position of the cars on the ground and there is an engine on the ground, too so there was obviously an engine at both the front and rear of this train, that engine, a very heavy piece of equipment, has been spun around, is perpendicular to the track and the number of cars off the rail, strewn about like leaves in the wind. Speed played a factor here. There had been a lot of criticism of the starting of this train, of this line. Local officials said they did not think the track could take a high speed train. And it's really not a high speed train. It's not like a Shinkansen or a Japanese bullet train. But for the U.S. trains, it was faster. And that's what they wanted, was faster service. But there was a lot of criticism that there were too many sharp curves or dramatic curves, as the one the train was attempting to negotiate when it came off the track, that they didn't think was sufficient for a high-speed train. Amtrak said they tested it. That is true, they did test. But how they tested, if they tested with a fully train component like here, several cars, front and end engines, that's not known.
[Jones:] You say it wasn't a high-speed train by that margin of error. But how fast are we talking here?
[Schiavo:] Seventy-nine miles an hour is what the track was rated for. But this curve, at this particular point, to me, 79 miles is very is a lot of speed for that kind of a curve. And also, it's not just the it's not just the curve. It's the component of the cars, where the weight is distributed. You know, physics is a funny thing. You change one little distribution of the weight and, on a curve, the centrifugal forces go completely out of balance. So I think that the NTSB, as soon as they get the black boxes, will have a good idea whether or not the train actually faced any obstructions on the track or if the rails were out of line or if this is a case where the pre-inaugural run of this train, while they may have tested it, they didn't test it sufficiently enough. And this was just too great of speed for a curve like this.
[Jones:] That's what's going to be so interesting, the fact that this was the inaugural run and there were potentially warnings about it in advance. Mary, we appreciate your analysis. Thanks so much, Mary Schiavo there. Let's bring in CNN's Rene Marsh now. Rene is in Washington, D.C., for us on the other coast. Rene, the NTSB are on their way there. It's some hours on a flight just to get to Washington State. What will they look for first off when they get there?
[Rene Marsh, Cnn Correspondent:] That's right. So it's going to be a team of 20 NTSB members, which is a relatively large team. They consider this a major incident. They will be looking for a number of things. Once they get on the ground, they're going to first want to collect any perishable evidence. Then they will want to do interviews with passengers, especially interviews with the crew that was on board. That will be paramount. They will want to get the train's recorders because that will hold some detailed information, everything from the speed of the train, when the brakes were applied, all of that critical information for them to piece this all together. They will also have a team inspecting the tracks
[Marsh:] as well as the signals to make sure that those things were working. So once they get there, they will all fan out. Of course, not to be forgotten, there will be a human performance team. That team will really be zeroed in on the crew. They will be asking the crew a wide variety of questions, everything from how much sleep they got the night before, what time they showed up to work, any medications they may be on, just a wide range of questions to get a feel as to whether there was any human element here, any human error, that may have contributed to this.
[Jones:] Rene, thanks so much. Rene Marsh live for us there in Washington, D.C. Thanks for staying across the story. We will turn to the other breaking news story we have for you this hour, a busy hour ahead indeed, saying weakness is the surest path to conflict. Donald Trump is unveiling a new national security strategy that he says will bring about peace through strength. The U.S. president just wrapped up a speech in Washington, his new strategy is based on his America first doctrine. Mr. Trump says it recognizes that there's a new era of competition on the world stage. He says the United States will seek cooperation with rivals but warns it will stand up for itself, quote, "like never before."
[Trump:] We face rogue regimes that threaten the United States and our allies. We face terrorist organizations, transnational criminal networks and others who spread violence and evil around the globe. We also face rival powers, Russia and China, that seek to challenge American influence, values and wealth. We will attempt to build a great partnership with those and other countries. But in a manner that always protects our national interest.
[Jones:] President Trump there. Let's bring in our reporters, live on the story for you tonight. Matt Rivers is in Beijing and Nic Robertson is in Moscow. Matt, to you first. I didn't hear him specifically call out China in his speech. It's there in the doctrine, the fact that he now, having spent the best part of a year trying to make friends with China, he very much sees them as a competitor. How is that going to go down then in Beijing?
[Matt Rivers, Cnn Correspondent:] Well, probably not that well. Certainly not well privately. Publically, we will have to wait until the sun rises here in Beijing to get a formal reaction publically. You're right; he didn't really call out China that much in that speech he gave. The speech is really an executive summary of this document. The document itself, quite frankly, calls out China in a major way, in a way that goes far beyond what we saw in the last time a national security strategy document was released. That was in 2015 during the Obama administration. In this document, they talk about China and Russia, for that matter, contesting the U.S. geopolitical advantages and trying to change the international order in their favor. They go down a litany of issues when it comes to China. They have issue with China expanding their military, including challenging commercial trade routes in the South China Sea. They talk about how China is trying to expand their political influence by investing money in infrastructure projects around the world, including in Africa. They reaffirmed their support for Taiwan, well, the United States under the Trump administration reaffirms the U.S. support for Taiwan. And they also, talking about trade, they go into detail about intellectual property theft, allegedly committed by the Chinese government over the years. This is really a strong document from the Trump administration when it comes specifically to China, calling out the Chinese government in a way that the Obama administration didn't do really back in 2015.
[Jones:] Nic Robertson is in Moscow for us. Nic, over the past couple of days, Vladimir Putin and Donald Trump have shared a couple of phone calls, very friendly phone calls. And interestingly, in President Trump's speech, just in the last hour, he didn't call out what is perhaps arguably at least the biggest threat to U.S. national security right now and that is Russia undermining American democracy.
[Nic Robertson, Cnn International Diplomatic Editor:] This has been a characteristic of his administration and the relationship, the poor relationship that he's having with his intelligence services, who have one view and most of the key officials around him have one view about Russia's role in this hacking and meddling in the U.S. elections last year. Yet President Trump doesn't seem to respond to that. We saw a reflection of that today, when he talked about the role that he sees Russia and China playing in the world in the future. He then almost in the same breath went ahead and said, yes, but we can have great partnerships where it's in our national interest and then started talking about the phone call that he had with President Putin this weekend, where President
[Robertson:] Putin had thanked him and thanked the CIA for providing timely information that led to the arrest of a group of terrorists under the direction of ISIS who were going to launch an attack in St. Petersburg at the weekend. Now President Trump said this information may have saved thousands of lives. We know this is a narrative where President Trump and President Putin agree. They both say that this combining of working together in their own national interests, in the joint national interests, to thwart global terrorism is a good thing. And this is exactly what President Trump was saying here. So rather than take strong shots at Russia and some of the other areas of concern, the cyber issues were kind of laid off way somewhere else in the speech, not aimed specifically at Russia and, really, again, reaching out with a warm handshake in that speech with President Putin.
[Jones:] Fascinating stuff. My thanks to both of you gentlemen. Nic Robertson in Moscow and Matt Rivers in Beijing. Thank you. We will continue talking about this story, about Mr. Trump's tough words on China and Russia and Pakistan and many others as well. I'm joined now by Jamie Metzl. a senior fellow at the Atlantic Council. He is a former executive vice president of The Asia Society and also served on the U.S. National Security Council during Bill Clinton's presidency. Jamie, thank so much for joining us here on CNN this evening. So throughout that speech from President Trump, it was very much America first and America strong. Peace through strength delivered by military might. How does that sit?
[Jamie Metzl, Atlantic Council:] Well, it's great for America to be strong. And American strength has been an underpinning of global peace, security and stability for the past 70-plus years. But if it's just America first and just America strong and it's not connected to what has been, for many, many decades, America's vision of a broader sense of peace, security and stability that brings everybody in, where America supports international law, international institutions, where American soft power sets norms for other countries to emulate, then American power is really not that meaningful. We will become another force in a global balance of power. And we know from the 19th and early 20th centuries, where the balance of power structure and where this overreliance on national sovereignty leads. Unfortunately, that destination is destruction or has been destruction and war. So I hope that definitely it's great for America to be strong. But America needs to play a role of envisioning a better world for everyone.
[Jones:] Jamie, just stand by for a second because the secretary of state, Rex Tillerson, has also just weighed now in on President Trump's speech and his national security strategy. He has issued a statement. I just want to read part of it to you now. He says, quote, "Whether the threats are rogue nations seeking nuclear weapons, terrorists plotting to attack our homeland or malicious cyber actors seeking to damage and destabilize our critical systems and infrastructure, we must remain vigilant against those who would do harm to our people and our way of life. "President Trump's new national security brings to bear all elements of American power, to protect our people, generate new economic opportunities and advance our interests and our democratic principles." The overriding theme there, Jamie, from what Rex Tillerson has said and also from what the president said as well is that the focus of this administration is not so much on cooperation with other nations. It's on competition with other nations.
[Metzl:] We live in a very competitive, dangerous world. And we always have. The question is, what is the right role for the United States in that world? If we are just another country competing in and insert name of your country first balance of power, dog-eat-dog world, we can do that. As a matter of fact, the United States can do that very effectively. But the issue is, what happens to the world? The reason we have the world as we have, the reason that we have these multi these international institutions and concepts of international law, the reasons why the United States has this strong alliance system, why we have partner organizations like NATO, why we support the U.N., isn't that we are altruists. It's that we learned the lessons of the first two World Wars and recognized that it's only by pooling sovereignty and addressing the problem, the scourge of nationalism, that we can build a better world for everyone. And the United States obviously can't be played by other countries. And certainly that world isn't perfect. But by stepping away from America's international obligation, by using this overheated rhetoric around national sovereignty, without articulating the way the world can work for everyone, I think it's a very dangerous step that the United States is taking. But having said that, there are some very good points in the national security strategy. It's absolutely true the United States needs to be tougher on China, needs to be tougher on Russia, needs to do a better job of supporting its interests. But if that's taken outside of context, the proper context, that can be very dangerous, not just for the United States but for everyone.
[Jones:] OK. We talked a lot about the content of the strategy of the speech as well. I'm wondering now, your reaction to the tone and the delivery, as someone who has no doubt been an observer of national security strategy announcements over the years. What did you make of Mr. Trump's performance?
[Metzl:] Well, Donald Trump is a very flawed deliverer of any kind of message on U.S. national security. And when he is delivering a speech about strategy, when, who knows what the origin of all of these tweets have been that have been very destabilizing around the world by many accounts I certainly believe that it makes it there's a fundamental mismatch between often some of the words and I don't believe that Donald Trump wrote all or any of the national security strategy or, frankly, all or any of the speech that he just gave. So there's the words. And there's the behavior. So if we believe what Trump has articulated, that the United States needs to be stronger by being tougher on China and Russia, well, contrast that to the actual behavior of sucking up to Putin, of undermining the investigation of Russia's interference in the U.S. democratic process or all of the things that he said about Xi Jinping and not advancing America's interests, not advancing America's trade interests, not promoting international law or human rights. If he believes, as he says, as is said in the national security strategy, that the United States has to strengthen our diplomacy and support international institutions, then that fundamentally conflicts with what we've seen in all of the actions or many of the actions of this administration to date and the gutting of the State Department and U.S. diplomacy. If he believes, as he has stated, that America is leading, then we need to see evidence of that leadership and returning to the best values of the United States, which, unfortunately, are under threat, both internationally and at home.
[Jones:] All right. Well, we will wait to see if there's any more substance in the 70-page I believe documents of this national security strategy. Jamie Metzl, thanks so much for joining us here on CNN this evening. We appreciate it.
[Metzl:] My pleasure. Still to come, on HALA GORANI TONIGHT, after 11 hours in the dark, the power is back on at the world's busiest airport. But the nightmare is not over for thousands of people, still trying to get on flights during what is, of course, the busy holiday season.