we've seen five young men from virginia turn up in pakistan on their way to the father. we continue to see a trickle of individuals of somali ancestry heading for east africa. so while i think that we are doing well, you know, the nature of the threat is always changing. .. i wondered, you tended to use the word violent extremism, words like islamist never came out of your mouth during your speech. and some people think that the obama administration has

turned its back and not taken the war on terrorism, if may use that term, as seriously as the result of the fact that you don't talk about role of islam. reminds me of when rob litak led the way with term rogue state. rogue reg geem. and i helped to do that, too and mind one albright said let's not use that term anymore. is the trace of language a way of communicating to the muslim world, quote on quote, that islam is not the issue even though there are extremists who are muslim? is that the purpose? >> i get this question with every appearance. i think that the best way to put it is that the issues of what constitutes true islam and what

does not our best answered among the muslims and non-muslims and if their concern is those who seek to use violence as a means to affect our policy and actions in the world. i would argue that it is a sign of our seriousness that we don't resort to that kind of language precisely because it has had such a negative affect in the past when people have gotten themselves tangled up in the issues of muslim doctrine, and i think that it is counterproductive for american political officials of any kind to start holding forth in terms of in doctrinal terms about what a religion says or doesn't and hasn't gotten us anywhere in the past and i don't think it will get us anywhere in the future.

that doesn't mean i as a scholar didn't write about it and other people don't have legitimate work to do in that field but from a policy perspective it hasn't gotten us anywhere. >> the gentleman in the front row. please identify yourself. this deck ambassador benjamin in the newspaper india abroad. i believe during a recent visit to the region you visited with india and since the mumbai attacks, u.s.-india counterterrorism cooperation has grown exponentially. but after the had to leave plea-bargain there has been concern in india because the u.s. has been reluctant to talk about whether he would have india what have direct access to headley and they feel that because of headley's scouting mumbai that they should be afforded access if not extradition which is now out of the poor because the plea-bargain and out of all of this conspiracy theory from

commentators etc. that there is an intelligence component to hockley etc tooby will you into the counterterrorism bureau sort of the urge direct access to the indians to hadley and in your remarks you also spoke about the fact that one has to stop the passage support to the groups and even people like bruce reindell and the indians keep talking about the fact that the u.s. house double standards in terms of pakistan military and isi assistance to the fact they sort of conceived as opposed to other groups which are an external existential threat to pakistan and. if you can address both of those. >> you're absolutely right. i was in india just last week and its striking the continuity of the question i get on these issues. [laughter] >> for the viewers could you distinguish between the [inaudible] -- and the al qaeda components of the pakistan questioned?

>> well, actually, rob, we are less and less able to distinguish because many of the speed eckert -- many of the speed groups like mlt are very much active in different parts of the country as well as in afghanistan. and one of the trends that we have seen is increasing sort of stitching together different groups and this is a great worry and we also see a rise in half freelancers. people who have their roots in one group drifting to another, contracting with the mother, and it makes for another one of the challenging aspects of the change in counterterrorism. but let me get to the gentleman's question. it is true -- i was asked this question very often in india.

let me be quite that -- quite categorical. there are legal issues at stake but what is not at stake is the indian government is getting every bit of relevant information from headley that requires. the issues of access our best handled by the departments of justice which handled the plea agreement and because of the legal nature of this it's really not something that is appropriate for me to be lobbying one way or the other. and my concern is that as you said, the counterterrorism cooperation between the countries continues to deepen and i have to say this is one of the positive stories in counterterrorism in the last few years. i don't think anyone would have believed we could have come this far with india in terms of cooperation as we have. and it is an inadvertent but

nonetheless important consequence of mumbai and a recognition that this is a shared threat. as for the issue of a double standard i don't think we have one. we have made very clear exactly how we feel about the groups. they've killed americans. it is a designated foreign terrorist organization. i did not hesitate to speak about either in india or in pakistan. let me tell you it's a threat we take very seriously as i suggested in my remarks. >> stanley and then the woman in the back. the gentleman with his hand up. >> stanley with the cato institute. president karzai has just issued a statement -- i'm sure you're familiar with it -- condemning the foreign interference and there's a fraud in each

election. this comes just a few days after the president's visit. so i'm wondering what this applies for our ability to cooperate in our common efforts against violent extremism. >> i have a feeling that was going to come up. [laughter] well, we've had a lot of experience with a lot of leaders who said different things at different times, and we have managed to work through our differences and achieved a good outcome and obviously it is a very challenging situation on the ground in afghanistan. there is no doubt that there are times when partners feel that their toes are being stepped on and times we feel we are being on necessarily constrained. i will say that i was just there and in my meetings with the

minister of interior minister of defense intelligence and the light i was not presented with any sense that we were unwelcome or the we were doing things that in any way undermine afghan interests. so i think that across the wide range of the government, the enormous number of people who we interact with every day i think that the relationship is working pretty well, and i think i will just leave it at that. >> nicely done. [laughter] the woman in the back. did you have a question? okay. please pass the microphone. >> good day, sir. [inaudible] -- fox news, russia. i have actually not one question put to. and my first one would be as you probably know, there are 40 people killed in recent suicide bomber attacks in the moscow subway. so, what is your view of the

effective methods of preventing, containing and investigations of such terrorist attacks as probably you might succeed with that? and my second question is going to be more general. what is a state of cooperation between russia and the u.s. and the counter terrorist field? thank you. >> let me take the second one first. we have very good cooperation between the u.s. government and with the russian government. i am pleased to say i have a close relationship with my opposite number, the president's special representative for counterterrorism, and i contacted him immediately after we got news of the moscow metro attacks. i think that my colleagues who work russia policy issues would agree that against the

background of all of the different issues that have been influx of the last few years and bilateral relationship counterterrorism has been the constant in terms of the level of cooperation, the atmospherics and the outcomes, and we are going to continue working on that as for example the secretary of state and foreign minister lavrov work together the g8 meeting just a few weeks ago. so i think we have a very good basis to work on and a shared interest by the way in expanding and further articulating the international organizations that deal with counterterrorism capacity building for example, and i'm hopeful but we will have more things to deliver in the near term. i'm reluctant to tell russians with the need to do to deal with their extremists. obviously the caucasus remains a troubled area. i don't think we have enough

information yet on who carried these attacks out. but, you know, and our experience good solid police intelligence were combined with effective prosecutions. we will make a big difference in terms of delegitimizing terrorists and undermining because they stand for so why don't i believe that that. >> the gentleman in the back. >> thanks. vladimir with rtv. to follow the previous question is there any corporation or intelligence sharing and were assistance between the u.s. and russian authorities on these terrorist attacks both in moscow thank you. >> well, we certainly offered assistance. i don't know that we have received response. we do exchange intelligence from time to time but i am certainly not at a position to comment on

current intelligence matters, nor should i. and so, you know, i think we will wait until a few more days have passed to see whether there is anything we want to discuss on that. >> the gentleman on the end, yes. >> from georgetown university. you give a very kind of positive view of what our government is doing and how we assess the situation. what i would be interested in is when you go home at night, you get ready to go to bed, what is it that you are most worried about but we are not doing, that we are not achieving? and the the threat of low probability but very high impact terrorist attacks against us?

>> there are lots of things that worry me at night. i'm someone who was coming you know, on september 11, 2001, holding a three week son when i got a call from cnn.com so i am fully alive to the issues of catastrophic terrorism. i think that -- i don't want to say that nothing falls into that category. we have incredibly complex infrastructure which as we have seen can be used against us. we have an incredibly innovative opponent genuinely learning organization, so it is often the things we haven't figured out yet that ought to travel to the code trouble less. i suppose when i think about it what worries me most is we are in a race in terms of keeping

our technological edge against opponents making very good use of newly available technologies and that they always or enabled by the fact that barriers to entry are falling. so, we do worry about wmd to the we do worry about the fact that every year that goes by tens of thousands of people are capable and adept at using the tools of the biotechnology, or who are very insight flat looking at the holes in our infrastructure. we saw a exactly this thing on december 25th where we saw essentially a new kind of explosive device being deployed. so, i guess my biggest concern is we are always on our edge and

i would add one other on point in the technological aspects of this i think the other thing that concerns me is what i was talking about when i was talking about countering violent extremism which is the challenge of learning how to change minds and affect social circumstances in ways that will move people away from extremism is a very difficult challenge and it's not one that governments have a starkly attended to in the past and so we think we are breaking new ground and i'm always hopeful but we are doing so fast enough because we do want to finally answer the question and say there are few were terrorists on the street today than there were last week. so i think those are the two big challenges. >> good afternoon, ladies and

gentlemen, mr. ambassador. my name is rosemary. volume the president of hope for tomorrow. we focus on violence against women and young women. i want to thank you. i come from kenya. i was in kenya when it was bombed by terrorism. i think that my comment is what do you think about the usa working with international community's because if you work with the local communities who are in those countries like afghanistan and kenya and africa i think that can work because it also working with women because the terms of our young people who are recruited like the one who almost bombed the airline. he was not in nigeria, it was in britain, so they go around and africa as nigeria became a victim of one person who was not in nigeria. so we want you to work with local and international

comandantes who understand the their communities the especially women and young people so you can work with the organizations in ten negative and other african countries and training and working with the young people and women and i think this can work. tried to remove some -- least some of the problems to the country's so they can solve -- they know themselves so this is my comment and i think i can work with you and i thank the secretary of state very much for working hard on this matter many times there for good work. >> you use the term microstrategy. >> let me turn that into a question. >> you use the term micra strategy in the talk and i think that goes to exactly where we are going to be if >> first let me say i was just in kenya at the embassy under ambassador karan burger working on these flexible we are very

concerned about rot acquisition in the nairobi neighborhood of easily which has an enormous population of somali refugees and for acquisitions are a problem. we fully believe that working as i suggested in my remarks as well but working for the empowerment of women it is important strategy in this regard because that is but a strategy for poverty reduction and for really diminishing radicalization and a lot of communities in which women today don't have the tools to oppose radicals and so both of those things are very important and as i said, every community is different. this is presents us with a real challenge because we need to have the analytical basis for trying to figure out what we do in particular communities. we need to work with partner governments and we often need to

work with ngo's because frankly people who look like me shouldn't be walking into some of these neighborhoods and trying to do social engineering. so, it's a complicated task. adis as i said something we are still in the early days regarding and i think it is a challenge for the government to operate in this way. we are used to large spread sheets and programs and one of and this is a challenge. >> to more questions. mark. >> good afternoon. thank you for your comments and service to the country. i am a student at georgetown university and my question related to what you said about combating the narrative of al qaeda is something you refer to a number of times and in the response to date with the micro strategy and other ways talking about the people you met with in pakistan you leave out the elements of what is involved but something you talk about all so that i felt was may be less addressed but was combating extremism here in the u.s. and

the extent which it's been on the rise and when i wonder is as an official of the u.s. department do you think there are lessons to be learned from government for example in europe that dealt with this than the u.s. and so with those are and i'm thinking in particular of the british government which when i was at homeland security had a robust program they were developing specifically focused on this issue. thank you. >> i absolutely think we have a lot to learn from others and that's why i have this from the foreign office in my bureau right now working on these issues and why we are talking to our partners in the netherlands, france, you name it about different undertakings in this area. i think that we would make a big mistake and interpreting american exceptional was some to mean that we are immune from the radicalization. as i wrote in the book is a

statistical inevitability. we have been very fortunate this far. we still are fortunate in having a low level with all kind of complicated issues having to with immigrants in the united states and the like but we absolutely do have a lot to learn from others and, you know, i think we should be honest here and laugh -- honest enough with ourselves to say that. skype final question. >> ambassador benjamin, thank you for a much. i am an independent consultant on energy. you mentioned the fact within the last year there has been increased cooperation with pakistan. bruce reindell also noticed the same development but he is not clear as to why in fact this is taking place. is it just because they realize that it's now in their own interest and it hadn't occurred to them before?

or are there other extenuating circumstances which may influence their recent stepping up that activity and as a follow-up by wonder if you could comment on the iran's role in counterterrorism. >> it's funny because bruce asked me that same question. [laughter] and i don't want to get too speculative, but i do think that an important part of what we are seeing is due to the growth of trust. our sense was for example at the end of the strategic dialogue we had really had a good exchange and have taken this relationship to the higher level. the history of u.s. pakistani relations has been a deeply troubled one.

there have long been influential pakistanis who thought that we did not have their interests at heart that we were purely in a transaction mode to accomplish our own goals and i believe that after very, very serious engagement the commitment of enormous resources efforts to deal with all kinds of legitimate concerns they have that we are making headway in and i'm not predicting progress will always be a linear but i'm hopeful that we will have the strategic patience and wisdom to stay engaged and see this through and, you know, a lot of people at higher levels than mine are investing in the enormous amount of time in this relationship and i think it's paying off, so let's hope for the best. as for iran, iran remains the

premier state-sponsored terrorism in the world today and that was obviously a huge concern for the u.s. government. iran however, iran's involvement with sunni extremist groups is a complex and often murky story. we know that in the past iran has been a place the al qaeda individuals have travelled across or resided in without necessarily the direct support of the iranian government. but when we look at the iranian state sponsorship we are looking principally at groups such as hezbollah, hamas, the smaller palestinian rejection groups. i think that you have seen press reports of the various officials talking about the iranian

support to insurgence vote in iraq and afghanistan. we have seen this at the tactical level. obviously iran has a lot of concerns about us being on both sides of its borders. the president has pursued an effort to open up new dialogue with iran. the iranians have not responded, so we are in a challenging situation at the moment and as you all know there's a lot of work going on at the u.n. in this regard. so, this is an ongoing story. >> i'm afraid our time has elapsed. you will be directed to a reception in an adjacent room. i would like to thank all of you for attending today and those watching today's proceedings on c-span, please join me in thanking ambassador daniel benjamin for an excellent presentation. [applause]

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an independent commission on contacting wholley meeting on planned reductions in military contracting work force in iraq. the commission heard from representatives of private contractors working in iraq. this is just under two hours. [inaudible conversations]