res. 22 of the 113th congress, the majority leader of the senate and the speaker of the house of representatives acting jointly in consultation with the minority leaders of the senate and house respectively have determined that the public interest warrants a convening of the senate at this time not withstanding the previous orders. the chaplain, dr. barry black, will lead the senate in prayer.

the chaplain: let us pray. immortal, invisible, god only wise, we look to you today for wisdom, as our lawmakers seek to do what is best for our nation and world. lord, we admit that our human intellects have limits, for we know not what tomorrow holds, but you do. so guide us, sovereign king, we are pilgrims on planet earth. we are weak but you are mighty; lead us with your powerful hand. amen

the presiding officer: please join me in reciting the pledge of allegiance i pledge allegiance to the flag of the united states of america and to the republic for which it stands, one nation under god, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all. the presiding officer: the clerk will read a communication to the senate. the clerk: washington d.c., september 6, 2013. to the senate: under the provisions of rule 1, paragraph 3, of the standing rules of the senate, i hereby appoint the honorable al franken, a senator from the state of minnesota, to perform the duties of the chair. signed: patrick j. leahy, president pro tempore. mr. reid: mr. president? the presiding officer: mr. leader. mr. reid: first of all, i appreciate very much the presiding officer willingness to come in today. i had a -- all prepared this coming monday to welcome

everybody back but i'm going to do that a few days early, so welcome back everyone. i hope you had a good break. i hope it was as productive as mine. mr. president, i am grateful for everyone's cooperation in getting us to this point. i now ask unanimous consent that a letter of knowification relating to section 2 s. con res. 22 be printed in the record. the presiding officer: without objection, the letter will be printed. mr. reid: mr. president, we convened the senate today in order to enable the senate foreign relations committee to report a joint resolution which authorizes use of military force of a limited nature against syria in response to the syrian regime and their use of chemical weapons. as we know, many, many people have been killed with this, including almost 500 children. the reported resolution was signed by committee leaders, senators menendez and corker.

they set a tremendous amount of cooperation and bipartisanship for this senate. i admire both of these good men for the work that they've done and the leadership that they show in allowing us to be at the point where we are now in this difficult situation. i ask unanimous consent the senate adjourn until 2:00 p.m. monday september 9, 2013. the presiding officer: without objection the senate stands adjourned until 2:00 p.m., monday, september 9, 2013. the senate to gaveling in briefly to the resolution. that allows majority leader harry reid to bring a resolution to the floor monday when the full body returns. that could set the vote by the full senate as early as wednesday. you can watch live coverage on the senate when they return from

their recess monday at 2 p.m. eastern here on c-span2. david gregory planning to have dinner with republican senators in an effort to pick up support in the chamber for military strike on syria. president obama set to make his case to the nation on tuesday about the u.s. response to this of course coming ahead of any possible votes in congress on whether to authorize military force. jack, congressional reporter for fox news tweets out john kerry, chuck hagel and martin dempsey are expected to return to capitol hill next or an appearance before the house armed service committee and you can check our web site for live coverage plans at c-span.org. state department this week u.s. diplomats and private citizens to leave lebanon to the security concerns as the obama administration and congress tried to work out the u.s.

response to the neighboring syria. arizona senator john mccain, a leading republican voice on the foreign relations who's in favor of military intervention has been holding town halls in his home state. senator mccain tweeting about the engagements in which he faced criticism on his stance. let's take a look. >> i met you years ago, and i've always been a supporter of you to get i always been a loyal supporter. the point is right now no one is denying there is a lot of

atrocities being committed in syria whether on the rebel side or the other side as well. the point is there is a good option to what has been happening in syria. for me to listen to you say there is no good option, i refuse to believe that. the good option right now is to take saudi arabia and iran and force them to stop supporting the two -- [inaudible] the two sides and syria. and you can do it. you can do it by diplomacy and negotiation, not bombs, senator mccain. we cannot afford -- [applause] we cannot afford to shed more cerium blood. personally speaking i have a cousin that is 18-years-old that was just killed ten days ago by the so-called rebels and al qaeda and they are not syrian. they are from all over the world to fight this. we cannot afford to do that.

we cannot afford to turn syria into another iraq. and afghanistan. [applause] i beg you. my family is there. there are so many civilians and a majority of the civilians want to save their country. and you need to also listen to the american people who do not want us to go there. [applause] because this is not an issue that we can take so lightly, senator mccain. enough is enough. we do not want another engagement in the middle east. we don't want to take over. whether you like the shaara al-assad or not i am not a fan either. but at least he has a secular government going on over there. it is secular, senator mccain. we are a minority over there. we are the minority christians who are unfortunately by you and so many in the senate are distancing our collateral damage

and i refuse to believe that. i refuse that, because i can raise my family name to the bible. we were there prior to, and we refuse to be forced to leave and to be considered a collateral damage. [applause] >> thank you. thank you very much. thank you for your passionate jig your compelling and emotional statement. all i can tell you is sali too have been to syria and i know the people that are there and i've met them and i know who they are. and i know syria well enough to know it is a moderate nation. it is in the nation that will embrace these armed fighters. but to say that botcharov al-assad -- bashar al-assad is anything than a butcher --

>> we will have more from some and the power the u.s. ambassador to the u.n.. she's speaking at the center for american progress at 2:00 eastern and you can watch the entire remarks live on c-span. yesterday former state and defense department officials took part in a discussion on syria's civil war and the impact of the military strikes on syria. hosted by the brookings institution this event was about 90 minutes. >> good afternoon, everyone. thank you for being here to discuss the syria through no fault of our own because of the last arrangements here fiona hill is on her way down so we

will have her come in and a second but she doesn't need to hear herself or my other colleagues introduced so i will begin. i am michael o'hanlon senior fellow at brookings and delighted to be joined by all of you and a distinguished line of of my colleagues to discuss the important issue of what we should do about syria and specifically the response or any possible response to the august 21st tragedy in which chemical weapons appear to be used by president al-assad's population in parts of damascus. but of course more generally, the conflict in a broad sense will also be fair game for our initial discussion and then for your question. what i would like to do after just saying a brief word of welcome the introduction about each of my colleagues is to begin with a question or two of each largely designed to eliminate to bring out areas of the respective expertise and also to get different viewpoints on the table. and then we will need speak a little among ourselves and then go to the halfway point. i'm joined today by bruce riedel, who i am sure most of

you know bruce was a 50 year veteran of the intelligence community in the u.s. government before joining brookings about a half a dozen years ago. he was an expert on counterterrorism and an expert on south asia as well as much on the middle east and his latest book is avoiding armageddon and about the u.s.-india pakistan history and relationship over the years but he's also been a great deal of work on the counterterrorism and certainly on al qaeda and that is one of the issues here today. next to him is michael duran during the bush administration and writing a book now on historical background in the middle east that president eisenhower specifically has written a great deal about syria and has had this house one of his big areas of expertise and focus now for a decade or longer. those of you that followed twitter and follow the pages in general will certainly have seen a great deal of his work. next to him is jeremy shapiro back as a visiting scholar after

having spent a number of years in the u.s. government and specifically the obama administration working among other things on this issue. he like others is speaking only for himself, but nonetheless will benefit from the experience and the insight he gained there. he's also the co-author with philip corydon of one of the best if not the best book on nato's role and the atlantic alliance role in the iraq war. very familiar on other aspects of the question with the international d date that is ongoing on the question. and suzanne maloney is one of the nation's best iran experts but certainly the best expert on iran's economy and the sanctions history that is now becoming so important in regard to the country and a separate issue. but maybe not so separate. one of the questions today for the nation is what extent is the iran nuclear issue closely intertwined with the d.c. area chemical issue because president obama's red wine issue about

both and of course iran is a major protagonist in the conflict in syria. and now the year up center and again, fiona hill thank you for being here and we appreciate your combining many things in a busy afternoon. fiona has written among other things perhaps the best and most compelling book on vladimir putin who's a key player in this drama as well and perhaps the president spending some time today and in one fashion or another his role in the conflict is continuing to be important. without further ado, let me please begin with bruce. i would like if you could just to recap where we spend august 21st and how airtight the case really is the use chemicals in a deliberate way against the syrian insurgent related to population centers.

>> the administration on this account is the case they have is pretty compelling. i started with a caveat. none of us at least none of us we know have seen the secret intelligence on which their case we have seen the summaries they've put out of the french have also put out and the summaries i think we get pretty compelling and there is a use of chemical weapons on the 21st of august i think there is a lot of additional social media evidence that's out there on facebook videos and others. and i think and i hope that the u.n. inspectors the trickier question of course is who ordered this done. the u.s. makes the case that i think is the most important and compelling argument. the trees the attack and they seem to have intelligence to trace the attack to being involved with the centers and the research science which is the scientific research institute known by its acronym.

it created the seeley and chemical weapons program back in the 1980's. i know that because my analysts uncovered it back in the 1980's. we were the first people to uncover the ceiling and chemical weapons program and sers was at the basis of it. it doesn't fire the weapons but it brings them to the battlefield and they make sure that the weapons are properly put together so that you get the phrase the biggest bank for the dhaka when you actually use them. the involvement was important in another way sers reports to likely to the office of the president in a cd and it is protected by the air force intelligence. pretty clearly it establishes the syrian government at a pretty high level afforded this attack we can't say that bashar al-assad did it but from this case what we have so far it

looks like a pretty compelling case. compare that to iraq which is not assessing the event and was responsible after the fact that the capability of an enemy in the future of the intelligence there was as it has been often said politicized. any member of congress who actually took the time in 2002 to read the classified national the intelligence estimate was discovered that was full of defense and full of arguments that the majority case was just plain wrong. anyone that read it would have discovered for example the nuclear laboratories believe it's building nuclear weapons was hogwash. when the lab said the intelligence community is hogwash, who should we listen to? i would listen to the people that actually make nuclear weapons. we have no reason to believe that there is any kind of consensus like that in side of the u.s. government. the last point, back in 2002 and

2003, there was widespread international difference. the french, the germans and the u.n. said basically that estimate was wrong. in this case we have pretty much the consensus with the exception of fiona that says the chemical weapons were not used by the syrian government. one fault of the administration's case is they were solely to get into the business of giving the wiretaps. i thought the intelligence community got out of the body taps in vietnam after we determined that we killed every member of the vietcong at least six times. at the end of the lineup and discussing other al qaeda affiliates and what extent american action might affect their prospect and even inadvertently a system. but first i would like to go to michael and you are a well-known advocate and syria.

you can choose how you respond to get there but what is the case for acting in the direct response to the august 21st chemical weapons usage in the way president obama has outlined a very specific limited single purpose discreet attack or response. what is the case more generally for changing american policy towards a more muscular approach in the civil war -- seeley in war and the problem is can you support a limited strike as the president proposes without revising all of america's syrian policy? >> that's a great pity that is exactly right. there are among the advocates for action there are two separate frames of reference. there's the president's frame of reference and then i will call that from a lack of a better term the mccain reference. i personally am more in the camp than the president the president

would say as he did yesterday that not just he that the international community and congress set a red line about the use of these kind of weapons you can't sit back and allow them to use without taking some kind of action they will be used again. secretary carey said yesterday in the house there is 100% chance that if we don't do something they will be used again. the mccain preference is a bit skeptical about this. its concern that a kind of one and a gun attack will not necessarily detour al-assad. he may retaliate and if he retaliates what are we going to do? how are we going to ensure that the days of attacks will have a

kind of deterrent at fact that we say it's going to have. and so mccain is calling for this is a civil war and it won't end until one side ends and the civil war ends. we need to decide which way we are on and support that side to win. so he is arguing for a much greater support for the syrian army. if they are shown to use chemical weapons as of april and you came back and said you were going to harm the army but the haven't really shown up yet. in order for me to support this, i want to see a much greater commitment to changing the balance of power on the ground on the battlefield. and that has put the president in a sort of uncomfortable positions and his rhetoric and shifted a bit. now he's talking about the

capability of the government. that is the model for mccain but he's still talking about a limited strike and that is the key democratic supporter as the frame of reference on chemical weapons on board. the emphasis from the democrats and the limited leaves us with a big question which to my mind is what is the overall strategy towards syria and how does this fit into it? >> i will add my own personal opinion. i think we actually have to do this because the credibility is on the line. credibility across-the-board and not just chemical weapons but in general there is a feeling throughout the region that the united states is receding from the region leading its allies alone expos on the battlefield. and i think that is very dangerous.

it's very important to act the same time they don't have to answer the same question about how it fits into some kind of broad strategy. >> i would ask you to respond because in a very collegial way you were a skeptic of the arguments you heard and i would invite you were generally to say whether you think we should respond specifically and also whether you think we should revise our steering and policy more generally. back over to you. >> there is an important point of agreement between mike and i and i emphasize that strongly because it is so rare. [laughter] when he says it's very difficult to sustain this limited calibrated intervention in american politics i think he is a very important and because he is to my mind this slippery slope here. i think we saw yesterday in the

senate resolution where mccain was able to get an further the goal about changing the balance of power on the ground in the senate resolution. on the line at this halfway measure that the president has proposed. we are on a slow-motion walk down a slippery slope and in my view we have been for quite some time in every decision that we make first it's to say that he must -- a sob must go and then it's to give recognition and nonlethal assistance and draw the line and to provide legal assistance and now this question of a strike. all of these steps towards intervention the last one and heels the next morning and when we knew this argument that the great credit devotees on the line. what this means and mike agrees

with this this is a very consequential decision to renew this in a very important step down the slippery slope, and it's unlikely to be the last that's probably the extent of our agreement. when i look at the specific case that the administration has made, i have some for why we should strike now i have some problems with. i think there are two elements that are -- the administration has made strongly and i think they are critical to assess john stuart referred to this as a seventh grade diplomacy but it is a very popular notion out there and i guess we should talk about. it's quite questionable. it gave us the vietnam war and i think we should interrogate it a little bit more carefully.

when i look at u.s. practice over the past 20 years in the use of force which is my product at brookings, so i look at it every day. the country that is unwilling to use force i don't feel the reputation of a country that is tenet as a political culture. to the contrary i see the culture that has used force for fish use great and small all over the world and has a reputation in most of the world and we have done is in the american administrations that are democratic and republican we have done it under the obama administration. and this is a country that has a reputation particularly after the iraq war. using force recklessly and incompetently and that is the reputation in the broader world beyond the middle east.

they see this as a country which is wasting its power and replaced in its resources on issues which are actually peripheral to the sensible issues in international politics and that is eroding our credibility in the wide world. i would note as a historical point that the empires do not typically fall because they are timid in the use of military power. that is not the story of the empires. the story of the employers is that the fall because they are reckless and they are overused in the military power and i think we should take that into account. the second issue is one of chemical weapons which has been raised. and the idea that it's in forcing the norm of chemical weapons in the case is critical to the spread and future use both in this hearing and beyond. to my point of view this is a misunderstanding of what has prevented the chemical weapons use over the last 100 years.

it's not been the question of enforcement. there's never been an enforcement of the chemical weapons norm. as we know, saddam hussein used these even against the civilians in kurdistan to a great effect. the reason the chemical weapons have not been used very much in the last 100 years is because there is a lack of utility in the use of chemical weapons. they are not actually that useful. it's quite possible that the regime is finding this out right now. i don't think that we have talked much about it. the place that was attacked did not fall to the syrian army. in fact it is still in rebel hands. from my point of view talking about these issues the red line the president drew last year was a mistake and i think it's important not to double down on

that mistake. don't do something stupid just because you did something stupid before. and i think that again, mike has a point that if you are going to get more deeply involved in this problem coming you need a broader strategy and a broad plan and then specifically needed a plan to stabilize syria. when i was in the government i saw a lot of plans to topple the al-assad regime. but not many plans to stabilize syria. this is what i came to call quoting seinfeld, the yada yada yada doctrine. and i think that as elaine put it on seinfeld, when yada yada yada is the most important part and that is how to raise stability. we never figured out how to do that in places like iraq and afghanistan and i think that there is little confidence in the u.s. government or beyond

that we could do it in syria. >> one clarifying point because you were very good to take that of the argument. you are not necessarily worried that the attack would fail in a sense of accidentally releasing or dispersing a lot of agent or not necessarily leading to the retaliation by al-assad although you worry about the latter. it seems that we americans won't be content with even a tactically successful strike. and it would just wind up being one step towards a quagmire of a much bigger involvement that you are so adamantly opposed to and then you would rather not see us taking those small steps irrespective of what the immediate provocation media. is that right? >> i think it is difficult to imagine the attack feeling on its own terms since it isn't supposed to accomplish anything. [laughter] >> we can certainly send cruise missiles and and certainly destroy some chemical weapons delivery systems.

i do assume that the military is careful enough not to disburse chemical weapons and to kill everybody in the middle east which is something that we looked at. so, i think that they can do that but that doesn't -- it's not intended to accomplish anything in the syrian civil war so it begs the question while getting us deeply involved. ..

>> well to the extent that the air rainians interpret american passivity in the face of a chemical weapons attack as a rationale for their own weapons development program that part, that of course left the barn a couple decades ago. the iranian view of precedent and international norms where it regards use of chemical weapons was really crystalized during the 1980s and use by saddam hussein and disregard of the international community and even as recent revelations of a project bruce has been involved with have demonstrated, to some extent, perfect awareness by the part of the reagan administration and other western governments of what was happening in iraq and the use of

chemical agents against iranian soldiers and iraqi civilians, this is the world view that has been set for the iranians. they from that experience they believe that the american invocation of international law, of norms on non-proliferation is entirely ma nippable. it is not a fixed interpretation of international law but a in order to further their aims and the way they see american aims in syria is an effort to destablize the region. to acquire a greater hold on resources in the region and to quell those rising powers such as iran which might be challenging to the. this united states. this is the rhetoric from the ayatollah out of chemical weapons was pretext. i don't believe the argument he is making that the attack never happened. there is subject of debate on iranian side.

we have seen different interpretation. i would argue somewhat of a pivot by the iranian leadership away from the russian argument this is simply a use by rebels or some other force towards an acknowledgement, somewhat cagey and disavowed and walked back and then walked forward but former president rafsajani that this was use of chemical weapons by the government. iranians our action or lack there off in syria i don't think will compel them towards future nuclear acquisition objective. the entire world view is framed by the period of 1980s. i was going to touch upon, i don't know if you come back to your question, i want to touch on your second question which is the relationship between the nuclear negotiations and our actions or decisions where concerns syria. this is really a delicate situation for the iranians. you have this new president who was elected very clearly by the

people and allowed to be elected by the establishment with a very explicit mandate to get some sort of progress on the nuclear issue in order to rehabilitate iran's relationship with the world. in order to reenbeige with the international economy and, you know, at a base in order to avoid some sort of upheaval at home because the economy and conditions within iran have deteriorated so greatly over the course of the past several years. so this is the last thing iranians wanted to be confronted with of the they didn't touch the issue of syria during their own presidential campaign which took place over the course of late may and early june. syria was almost off the table entirely. they were almost focused entirely on the syrian issue. i would imagine president rahani and those around him would have want opportunity to make progress. we've seen interlocutors and the sult tan of oman and former u.s. official who happens to be associated with the united

nations visiting tehran over the course of the past several weeks and clearly there are signals packed back and forth between the two governments. unfortunately the iranians don't have the luxury of avoiding the syrian question. this requires a hahn any, to marshall his own political capital at home in order to control hard-liners who are clearly invested in what is both strategic and idealogical commitment to iran's longest standing ally in the arab world and it requires him to find subtle ways to signal to the international community even on syria, even on this very sensitive question, iran in fact can act in pragmatic ways. it has been a somewhat messy process. interestingly that pivot and that signaling has happened over social media. perhaps more than anywhere elsewhere the president has been tweeting and the foreign minister has been on facebook but i think it is, it is a pivot that is meaningful and the fact that we're seeing a restraint, even in the rhetoric of the supreme leader, we're not seeing

the sort of commitment, rush to the defense of assad that one might have expected. i think it is an indication that the iranians are going to try to play this carefully. the precedent that i have compared this to and i think the best-case scenario for the united states would be, in iran that behaves a a little bit in e same fashion that former president rafsanjani did toward the international coalition that attempted to evict saddam from kuwait in 1990 and 1991. very different circumstances because the relationship with saddam was a very problematic t was episode for iranians that was very contentious at home. there were a lot of radicals who wanted to see iran go to the barricades on behalf of saddam of all people. rafsanjani in early part of his presidency, his mission and mandate was to fix the economy had to rein in his own radicals in order to step back from that conflict and project a kind of

neutrality. rahani has a much tougher challenge ahead of him to do that but i think that is what he is trying to do. >> that last question, sounds like iran is unlikely try to unleash hezbollah, quote, unquote, or make a major retaliatory blow against american allies in the event after u.s. strike because they don't want to bog down their own relationship in washington with a lot of extra stuff, is that a fair interpretation? do you think there is good chance with on its own or iranian quieter interest, hezbollah might escalate and might attack israel in response to any u.s. cruise missile attack? >> making predictions to iran and hezbollah is actually a tricky proposition. i think what we're seeing now is an effort to embrace a more pragmatic position even on something like syria. obviously the relationship with hezbollah is a complicated one. they are closely aligned, tremendously supportive of hezbollah. they created and nutured hezbollah at its outset.

they don't control hezbollah. they don't pull the strings. it is an autonomous organization with its own interests in the past on a number about occasions particularly where it regards syria have in fact differed from iran. i don't think we can predict precisely what hezbollah will do based on rahani's own preferences who appear to be endorsed by the supreme lewd leadtory get an answer on nuclear issue. there is probability that hard-liners who are quite invested with bashir and relationship with damascus will look for ways to respond and retaliate against the united states. this is going to be i think an important indication where the balance of power lies within iran. >> i should mention, suzanne has a very, very good blog on iran which this issue and of course iran's new leadership and nuclear negotiations if they develop will continue to be covered. could you please remind everyone of the exact address while we're on topic. >> www.iran@siban.com.

>> thank you. mr. putin, there are things i imagine you want to say especially at moment he is hosting our president right this very minute. but beyond that, let me put the question to this way and you can go anywhere you wish with it, looks to me like putin is accomplishing his goals because i assume he cares less about bashar assad and assad's prospects for winning the war. he care looks to me, like bogging down the united states and if i has another opportunity to do that, to slow down our global hogemny as he perceives it that is a good day. therefore as this debate is playing out with the rest of the world waiverring, with the u.s. congress not sure where to go, mr. obama sort of out on a him, no -- on a limb, no particular likelihood of assad being overthrown regardless, this looks to me sort of what putin

would have ordered. am i wrong? am i too cynical? how would you interpret his real interests in this crisis? >> i think mr. putin wasn't hosting obama and everyone else at g20 right now and was listening to this he would be even more convinced he had been making the right choice all along for months and firm on no intervention in syria. the thing that he is most interested in is not keeping us, you're absolutely right on that. he said that recently in number of interviews. he is out and about all over the place recently expressing his thoughts that he previously kept somewhat behind wraps. he made it very clear it is not about assad. that is the not endgame in syria. what is the endgame is making sure we're not going to see yet another massive mess on the map. we would argue we're already there. but putin thinks and if he was listening to this he would think even more we could make it a whole lot worse than it already is. he is facing next year, withdrawal of united states from

afghanistan. ironically he would like us to be there. this is one area where putin was quite relieved was in. admitted he didn't want us to come out in victory. he liked idea we were bogged down. he thought we might be bogged down in some kind of way we would stay, not that we would be heading out like the soviet red army headed out a couple of decade previously. now he looks at syria and he thinks, u.s. intervention and just like jeremy, he doesn't probably spend every day think about u.s. interventions but he spent a lost time looking at them over the last 20 years and before when he was in the kgb, studying what the u.s. is up to. he doesn't also think that the u.s. intervention have come up with anything beneficial to russia let alone the united states. so his one goal in all of the activity that we're seeing in syria is to have been preventing or rye straining the u.s. from intervention because he doesn't know where the endgame is going to go and he would much rather have bashar assad with all his problems in place and keeping

some semblance of control and complete chaos putin thinks he sighs in iraq, afghanistan and in libya. so putin son the same page as many members of congress asking is this going to be benghazi? is this where we're going to head? until he gets some kind of response from the president, then again he is following very closely what the president is saying to the u.s. congress or the president has been saying in stockholm, he wants answers as well. he wants to know what is going to be in syria at the indof the day? what am i and everybody else going to be stealing were? on that front russia's middle east policy is pretty much misunderstood at moment. this is not the cold war. in fact if you look at series of alliances has in the middle east they're pretty weird. not just hang out with the mullahs in iran it is israel. israel is big partner with russia. that is completely different from the cold war era. iranian, hezbollah inspired attack by iran on israel would be a disaster for russian

policy. he would like to -- he is very keen on keeping current status quote as much as he possibly can in the middle east. he has been extraordinarily alarmed by the sudden shifts in the middle east profile of the, who is in charge. he is probably very relieved that the military are back, for how long in the case of egypt. he didn't like the arab spring. he didn't like any of the implications that that had are not just for the middle east but whether it might spur more extremist groups to turn their attentions from there, centers of operation in places like syria elsewhere and start think about attacks on russia. ever since putin ended in some fashion the war in chechnya he has been extraordinarily relieved all the extremists have gone somewhere else. he does not want them coming back especially with the nice winter olympics just poised in the new year of 2014, ready to showcase all the billions he lift rally expended there to make these go well. so there are all kinds of things

that putin doesn't like about this it is not the old cold war view. it is not middle east order russia or anyone else and he is just as nervous for the rest of us what the u.s. will do and what the implications of it are going to be. >> thank you. a couple more questions from me and then we'll go to you. bruce, i want to ask about al nusra and other al qaeda affiliates in syria and over course of the war allowed them to grow stronger within the insurgency. that is point one. there is concern, maybe our inaction allowed that to happen. now there's also the possibility that our action, our strike, may further strengthen al-nusra. how do you size up these prospects? >> if we step back and look at the development of syrian civil war, this start the out as a genuine movement, largely non-violent, largely peaceful for political change in syria. 2 1/2 years later it is not that anymore. it is a sectarian war, very ugly sectarian war. if you look at the news today,

there is horrific new violations of human rights this time bit syrian rebels. what began as an arab spring turned into a sectarian war which largely pits the alawite minority, roughly 15% of the population and christian minority, another 10 to 15% against the sunni majority. leaving out the kurds who are a third player in all of this who basically already set up their own little entity in northeastern syria. so this sectarian conflict between the alawite christian front and the sunni has become increasingly violent and dangerous. the sunni front, the opposition, the resistance as we call it, is incredibly fractured. coring to the defense intelligence agency this summer they could identify 1200 separate parts of the sunni opposition movement. even if that's off by 50%, and there is only 600 parts, this is a very, very dysfunctional

movement. al qaeda came to this very late. there was no al qaeda at the beginning. now al qaeda has come on very strongly, using its base nearby in iraq. we now have two quite significant al qaeda franchises operating in syria. one is is the al-nusra front which is, it says it is syrian origin but it acknowledges got a lost assistance from al qaeda in iraq, which claims to be directly under the control of al-zawahiri in pakistan. the second is islamic state in greater syria which is al qaeda in the iraq which says no, we're in charge, we're running this operation from heres on end. we have the authority from usama bin laden to be here. anyone who tells you that the various al qaeda functions are 30, 40, 50% of the resistance, your alarm bells should go off. how do they know that? anyone who tells you there are

5,000 al qaeda fighters in iraq and syria, your alarm bell should go off. how do they know things like that? it is doubtful al qaeda knows how many people have in syria. don't engage in body counts or over simplifications. fundamental reality is two significant al qaeda groups moved into iraq and have become among the most robust and growing parts of the resistance to the bashar assad government. now if we tilt the playing field in iraq, syria, i'm sorry, syria, against the assad regime inevitably that helps al qaeda. there is no way we can not help al qaeda the more we, quote, degrade the syrian regime and its military capabilities. we can probably offset that tilt in favor of al qaeda to a certain degree and i've written about some ways we can mitigate the impact but we should have no illusions that the end of the day the more we weaken or as the economist says, hit them hard,

bashar assad, we're going to end up having a bigger al qaeda problem in the future. now if you have a strategy that says, okay, we're willing to take that risk up front now because we're pretty confident we know how we're going to get to the end, that's one thing. if as jeremy suggests you have a yada-yada-yard did i strategy how to go from a to c, you need to spend a lot more time thinking about b and how we avoid inad haven't atly helping al qaeda get a stronger base in the middle east at this time. one last point about al qaeda. al qaeda is at a crossroads. al qaeda was threatened by the arab spring when it began. the whole philosophy of al qaeda, the only solution to the problem of rye depression, to the problem of american influence in the middle east was violent jihad was challenged by the arab spring. it wasn't jihad that toppled

hosni mubarak. it was twitter, it was facebook. 2 1/2 years later, al qaeda is in the position of saying, we told you so. it wouldn't work. twitter, great, fine. mubarak is back. there's a counter revolution. we told you jihad is the only answer. what this president does about the problem of al qaeda not just in syria but in the entire region right now will determine the vector and importance of al qaeda for the next decade. we are at a crucial crossing point, not just with regards to syria but with al qaeda in the broader middle east and arab world and islamic world as a whole. >> thank you. although you have riled michael doran up because you said something about twitter. until then you were playing fair. i have one last question. two-parter, one mart for michael and one part for jeremy and we'll go to you. one on role of congress. i want to hone in for each of you might be the more difficult scenario. for michael, say both house of congress in their own separate ways vote down the idea of

authorizing a strike, should mr. obama strike anyway. for jeremy if they both vote yes, what does the president do with that newfound permission? does he pocket it until rainy day decide at future date offense were great you would even support a strike at that time but otherwise do nothing? or has he essentially committed himself by asking for this permission? over to you two, and then to you. >> thanks. let me start by saying something that's really obvious but i think we should think about it for a second. i actually agreed with almost everything jeremy said. it is just the conclusions i draw from the same analysis. the thing i want to say that's really obvious is, here we've got a president who for two years showed not just a reluctance, he basically informed the american public more or less, if he didn't, then members of his administration did, that intervention in syria is pure folly. nobody can seriously argue that

president obama has been looking for a pretext to get involved here. add another factor. public opinion is overwhelmingly opposed to this. i think that is also, that's also obvious. so a third factor. the military doesn't want to do it. i have never seep body language less supportive of a military action than what i saw in the chairman in the, in the hearings, right? so public, the president doesn't want it, public opinion doesn't want it, the military doesn't want it. here we are, here we are talking about a proposal to intervene in syria by the president, put forth by the president. to me this is an incredibly, an incredible statement that the president, up until this point, has not defined american interests correctly in syria. and that has been, that's been

my, that's been my point all along. is that, interests are objective things out there in the world, it is meeting point between objective things out there in the world and the way you conceive of them. and there's a point at which, there's a point at which your conception of the world sort of determines interests and there's a point at which, objective things determine interests, but if the two of them get too far out of whack, then you're going to have some really horrible cognitive dissonance. order in a uncomfortable position where you get a no vote in congress it's a real political defeat for you at home. forget about foreign policy for a second. he will be severely weakened at home if he gets that no vote. so therefore there has to be redefinition of what our interests are. it has to be a paradigm shift to recognize we're here for a reason. this slippage you described is not something that happened that people weren't trying to slip that way, they weren't careful,

they were all along trying to hold the line and defined it incorrectly so they couldn't hold the line. i'm sorry i'm going on a little bit. one more point here. our allies in the region, turks, saudis, kuwaitis, jordanians, israelis they all came to washington and said to president obama, you've got to do something. the turks are now, it is an amazing thing, by the way, not just the sunni muslim powers, european powers, french, british said you have to do something. over last two years. first it was quiet behind the scenes. then it was, then it was visits to the white house combined with leaks to the press in an unprecedented way. now we have the turkish politicians out loud, we want, an intervention. i have never seen anything like this in at least 20 years of following the, of following the middle east. the president could have, two years ago, taken those elements, created a coalition, built up

the free syrian army, and then when this moment came, he would have had elements he could put out front and we wouldn't be looking at a unilateral american action. he didn't want to do that, uh-oh, slippery slope, if i start building coalition, next thing you know i will be there with boots on the ground. what he has is just the opposite. now comes time when he realizes we do have interests in the middle east, we do have interests in syria, we've got to take action and looks around, come on boys, there is nobody there because he didn't build the coalition. we have to build the coalition now. that's why we have to act. that is why he has to act, whether he gets the authorization or he doesn't. because the goal, the goal of acting is not, is not simply to have a military effect on the ground. it is too, it is to transmit our intentions and our willingness to put skin in the game to all of our allies, so we can start coordinating them. part of our problem in, part of our problem in syria is not just what our enemies are doing, also

what the allies are doing. the turks want to dupe pell assad. what are they doing? turning blind eye to foreign jihadis coming through. they're not supporting al qaeda. they're going like this and letting the border open. supposedly we have a strategy, a global strategy to combat al qaeda. one of our closest partners in the middle east, also a nato ally, is supporting al qaeda in syria. that's a huge strategic failure which we have to think about. >> thank you. jeremy. assuming there is a yes vote from both houses, assume you would advocate the president not to strike anyway? >> i would but i think that, you know, he didn't, he is not bluffing on this. and he did, and, he did, change his opinion of the wisdom of a strike as a result of the august 21st attack. and i think that, from the, from the standpoint of the u.s. government, the chemical weapons

issue has always been very different and that's why i think you see, this change in the president's view on the wisdom of intervention, albeit a very limited intervention in the last few weeks. it was always the case that, and i think it is extend back into the clinton and bush administration, that there is an incredible institutional focus on weapons of mass destruction and chemical weapons are, are considered part of them and, we had a completely different process for chemical weapons within, within the u.s. government on, on syria and they, the u.s. government has always taken that interest a lot more seriously and so the development, and thought of it as he separate. so the chemical weapons development within the syrian civil war is something that president wasn't kidding when he drew this red line a year ago, in my view he shouldn't have done it but he wasn't kidding.

and that's because of the way that the u.s. government sees chemical weapons. i think that is what explains some of of the change in opinion. i don't think that's the right way of seeing it. so i think he will act, he will act if congress gives him permission. i think we have to note another aspect of, i think the reason that the policy has developed in this way that is very unsatisfying to both mike and is that the president has always been seeking, to sort of balance audiences on this question. the administration has always been seeking to balance audiences on this question. i think anonymous administration official said last week they were looking for a response that was just muscular enough not to be mocked. and, that was sort of how they did it all the way through. it was, you know, every time something happened, the united

states had to have a response because we're the united states. we need to have a response. the chinese didn't feel need for a response. but we did. and so we were always sort of looking for the minimum that could be done to satisfy the desire and, in the, in the political culture for a response and, but, that wouldn't get us anymore involved. and that is i think how in part how we've gotten to this place where the noninterventionist and interventionists are pissed off. >> we'll go to you. i will take three questions at a time. i would prefer if you don't mind the person you most like to answer. if there is question you don't feel you can do that, we'll accept the question anyhow. we'll go down the line after i have three questions. please wait for a mic and identify yourself when you get a microphone. we'll begin with gary, harland and the woman five rose back. that will be our first group. >> thanks very much.

i'm garrett mitchell and i write the "mitchell report" and i want to, i think, probably the person i would pose this to is to michael in his role as moderator it has been clear that we have differing perspectives about, what we should do in syria. there is one thing it seems to me the panel is in complete agreement on, and that is the president has not been able to state the case for america's strategic interests in syria. . .

i don't think of them as an unintelligent man. so it raises the question for me whether these terms we love to use in washington and america's strategic interest is a lot of hooey. the question is there such a thing as american strategic interest, and if so can i take a swing at it today? >> exceedingly well in discussing a lot of amorphous things and i want to associate my views with russia that we don't appreciate in washington. i have a three part question that stems from mardy dempsey

the their day. he said yes we can degrade terror but can the entire panel tell me what it takes to the tour assad? how do you quantify a qualitative terms and then what do you think the syrians will do next? >> six rows back. >> my name is the ibm and i've worked the past 20 years on the civilian armed conflict and i think that is really what we are all talking about here today. one of the questions that hasn't been asked is to the syrian people want this intervention and it appears to me on both sides that there is a lot of question about what's going to happen to be a tremendous amount of fear and we are already seeing a lot of movement. we've given up on the security council. they have dramatically failed in

terms of following their many resolutions on the protection of civilians. there is a third half if you will where the americans can still take leadership but perhaps back off from what i think is going to be perhaps a big mistake and may not make things better for civilians at all and syria. the third would be to consider taking at the general assembly and to utilize the resolution 377 united for peace which has been rarely been used but is a way to if you will run the end run at a round of the security council and make certain demands such as the referral to the icc for assad and others that violated the international law and to demand a ceasefire to stop atrocities and investigate atrocities and to create safe areas for the u.n. proposal that has been turned down in the security council in the past. with the french and the u.n.

taking on the role of the no-fly zone this would give some time. there would be a lot of planning required and allow the president to maintain credibility i think. we are going to take the leadership on this and step back and take a little bit of time to think about what is best for all of the syrian people including the christians etc.. and in the meantime help build. sorry i'm going on so long but to build support for the ability of the council, the local council to govern because i read recently that it is the jihadists providing food and medicine. they are taking leadership with the local people whereas of the local council affiliated with the opposition are doing absolutely nothing in terms of taking on responsibility for their people. so these kind of ideas this is a tall order and it's very

expensive. i recognize that but this is expensive anyway no matter how you look at it. >> we will look down towards anybody that wants to respond to one of the three and maybe we will start the other way the next time. on the broader question of humanitarian issues and syria, brookings is hosting an event at 10:00 led by elizabeth ferris as i'm sure you all saw the estimated refugee pullout of syria at the top 2 million the internally displaced member is in the range of 3 million getting to some of the issues that you are raising. let me respond to garrey if they want to correct me or handle other questions. i think that for a long time we said to the extent the problem and syria can stay inside syria. it doesn't reach president obama's threshold for saying there is a strategic interest. mr. assad caused a love of trouble and support for hezbollah but it's been a level of support that has been generally tolerated by israel as well as the united states where

it wasn't more than, what, three years ago secretary clinton and senator kerry at that time were hoping that assad could be a reformist because it doesn't get to the issue of syria's importance but in terms of where it was seen three years ago that wasn't necessarily popular thing to say but it suggested at that time we thought syria could be managed and kept in a box. obviously with the refugees and the potential for al qaeda sanctuaries and the broad implications for all the neighbors i think the syrian civil war is now seen as something that doesn't stay within its borders. and as i heard my colleague catholic who is celebrating today and is therefore not on the panel but otherwise would have a lot to dad, i've heard him say that it's the regional implications that have to be focused on and they become a big deal. so by itself come in and of itself in its borders, you could

argue that syria was something we could have ignored and did ignore for many years. michael was basically predicting we were going to be heading for trouble and this wasn't going to stay within its borders and that is where the problem of prizes and that u.s. strategic interests are engaged but on that same question let's work down the road. >> i would just add a bit to that. since the assad dynasty took power and that is what you're dealing with is dynasty come in 1970 we had a hostile relationship with syria. from mixing until now has maintained sanctions and we have lived with that. the problem is a manageable problem. but location, location. syria spills over into key parts. israel, jordan, turkey. my own view israel and turkey are capable of taking care of themselves, the jordanians are much less capable of doing so.

that's why i think the one thing the president has done over the last two years which everyone would agree with is that he's tried to strengthen jordan so they can handle the spillover but it's now becoming almost a flood, very hard to deal with. it's the spillover. the grade and detour. nobody thinks it's a good idea to bomb chemical weapons because when you do that, you disbursed chemical weapons. so, that is not a good solution. boots on the ground to get them, secretary carry briefly hinted at that yesterday and if he hadn't walked back in an instant we would have the power. he would vote no right then and right now to throw them out so we aren't going to get them if we want to go in and get them is a very, very complex and dangerous task. the best place to deliver them. that is a more doable task. as a military analyst mike can probably see more about that but

it's a hard task. they figured out a lot of ways to deliver this year the in the chemical weapons. and the way that they have delivered it in damascus was a way that we hadn't really seen. syria had that capability before. so this is an opponent that is developing new capabilities making it harder to degrade. i think we can detour it. they have a lot of experience with the assad dynasty in a lot of experience over the years giving it eight whack making sure they don't get back. most importantly in 2007 when they took out the north korean nuclear reactor and they basically sat there. they said nothing, literally. we can draw from that. the danger is this. if assad feels that the end is in sight and the christian community sees the end in sight, they will do anything because the desperate. most and many christians and syria believe if they lose the

civil war it isn't a question of being relegated as second-class citizens. it's a question of mass slaughter. until that impression changes inside of syria, i think that at the end of the day, the assad regime if it has to will use any weapons it has when it sees that coming to the and any strategy that wants to tilt the battlefield needs to think about that. >> on the detour question let me add to what bruce said, the best way to answer that is kenneth pollock who isn't here but he has written a paper on the related issues on the military analysis of all conflict and i would urge anybody is interested to see his paper which is on the web site. on your question about interest, a few points. let me make one observation that i do not think has sunk into a lot of people. it's obvious if you think about

it. we have got 120,000 people killed we have 2 million refugees, the vast majority were killed by the regime. the regime has been carrying out terrific attacks from the beginning dropping tnt on the bread lines and using the fixed-wing aircraft and artillery. also if you haven't seen them come and go on youtube and look at some of the torture of videos that are out there. why do i see this? because this is what the entire islamic world is looking at day in and day out. unbelievable perfect slaughter and we aren't doing anything about it. i just want to point out to you that we may feel that we are not culpable in any way. the assumption in the islamic world is that we are capable. it's that we actually on the shiites to win and the slaughter to go on. and that is the perception that we need to think about when we formulate our policy.

because the wing of misery around syria now is so unbelievable what's going to be a problem no matter what happens there's going to be a lot of blow back as far as the strategic interests are concerned the war is no longer civil war the it's a fight in the region for the regional order to be to put it in the simplest term it is iran, syria and hezbollah and saudi arabia and its allies. it's more complex than that. we have the kurdish component, al qaeda and so on. so al qaeda, iran, russia. they all understand this is a fight for the regional order. they are trying to shape the regional order so that the works in the advantages of their friends. we need to do almost exactly what the demand sheet the regional order so that it works

to our advantage. and the spillover that bruce mentioned, that is the whole regional question. we are going to having at least the next 20 or 30 years. what is it going to look like and what we want it to look like. how to restructure this thing so that it serves our interests which include, by the way, the interest as i was saying before. making sure that we do not have to carry out as many unilateral military operations as we will have to carry out if we don't put structures on place on the ground that can look after interests. and if we want to run for the interests are other than this whole regional order questions that are at stake and syria there's a proliferation of weapons and use of weapons of mass destruction country al qaeda, countering iran and that humanitarian concern to stopping

the slaughter and simply alliance maintenance. i would say all of those. where to begin. of [laughter] i think that the strategic interest and syria are basically it fundamentally about regional stability. we should have divided it up into three. first the regional stability but that he talked about. all the spillover problems. second was the weapons of mass destruction and chemical weapons which is an internal issue in syria and other internal issues. and those were seen as the three core strategic interests. two of them were in turmoil and one of them was external. but i agree with you that the president and the panel have had trouble on articulating the strategic interest and i think it's important to think of why the reason the panel has had trouble is that we are not that

talented, but the president get paid a lot more money. and he should be able to do it. why hasn't he? i think the reason he has had a problem is that within our political culture as the president you articulate a strategic interest and you are expected to accomplish it and satisfy it. he doesn't have a way of doing that. he doesn't know how to solve the syrian problem. so he is reluctant to define it in the stark terms as i just did list to take on that responsibility and be judged against. and this is a core problem on american policy in the sort of age of relative decline which is we have within our political culture the sense that we are not attend, but we have within our presidency a sense of limits and that is very difficult to

explain to the american public. and so, we are where we are. in terms of responding to some of my explains, i think the horrific violence that we are seeing and syria and particularly that's been visited upon the sunnis does have an effect that he's talking about and the sunnis definitely and syria definitely blamed the united states among other people. the al lights and syria also blamed the united states and i think that in the case of intervention, in the case that we need everything they asked for they would still blame the united states. there is certainly no greater crime against the people and to liberate them and they will never forgive you for that. and i think that when you intervene you inevitably get wrapped up in the domestic

struggles you do not fully understand. and you inevitably become an object of domestic politics in ways that are difficult to control. we have seen that very strongly in iraq. we have seen that very strongly in egypt where the only thing the political spectrum seems to agree on is that it's all america's fault. so the difference that we have now is that we are not as involved. we can step back. i think what -- if we were to get involved we wouldn't leave that sense of blame we would simply reinforce it and spread it. >> suzanne? >> i'm not sure the question gets at what is missing. i think that if we hear as well as the date on the hill and elsewhere in washington and number of compelling arguments about what our strategic

interests are or are not and they've been articulated by my colleagues here so i won't go over them. i think the problem is that by jeremy put it best, the yada yada yada strategy. whether or not we have the interest, but we don't have a strategy. the president hasn't articulated a strategy and frankly neither have those proponents of aggressive action on the mccain framework that michael referred to. no one has articulated a strategy that is likely to advance our interest to the this idea that simply getting into it is going to shape the regional order. these are buzzwords. it doesn't tell you how you get the end state and syria in the outcome that we prefer. a stable country ideally with some space institutions at least in the next century which is not a threat to its own people or its own neighbors. i continue to have ringing in my

head of the words when i visited tehran shortly before the american intervention in iraq and he told me this is going to go badly not because it is going to go badly but because they certainly played a part in that. we have seen the movie before. we have been there before. they are looking at syria with very much the same high -- eyes. it's wonderful to jump in and want to use our resources which they may have compensated for or not. in order to advance their own individual self-interest of agendas. the chart a path forward which in fact lead to the outcome that we want or doesn't leave us with a big yada yada yada problem and a sink hole in the middle east and the beacon for those that are already having spillover

effect and its strengthening many of our adversaries around the region. >> on the cultural from seinfeld to lawrence of arabia i have peter o'toole stressing around looking rather dashing. this is where we've been before. we've been watching this for a long time. this is in the days of the british aristocrats sitting around not with glasses of water that gin and tonic thinking about what to do with the collapse of the ottoman empire. the reason we saw the millions of people dispersed there were armenians and other cities in the ottoman empire and exactly the same way with the attempt and the casualty rate and in 1915 we had a the genocide and the armenians as a result of the fallout of the empire in the end of world war i to read and this hadn't been lost of people on the region and if we actually go

through she stopped talking about the collapse of the russian empire. we are 100 years out now from all of the consequences that got stalked off and kind of from the balkans and spread across the whole of the region the ultimate spillover. and we are still trying to figure out that regional order. unfortunately it isn't quite as nice and neat because we have no ideas how this is going to play out. it is incredibly complex. and as i said before, putin has a strange set of alliances in the region with iran from israel and assad and syria and it's because they are not in his view proselytizing the sunni regime's who want to stir up trouble. and elsewhere in russia itself and he doesn't want to be on the part of the sectarian conflict. he doesn't want to take the side of the shiites this is why he's

looking to israel and others, too. he would like to see everything back as it was before not because of the cold war permitted but because this strongman going out and keeping everybody behind closed doors. so this is the mess that we are and now. the problem is nobody knows how we are going to solve that. as we look back maybe we should have a screening of lawrence of arabia to journey to the mice commentary and give it a little bit of a break but it would show us the things that we are dealing with today. >> we will begin here in the second row and then we will work back. >> thanks very much. we talked a lot about the justification and the strategic frame and the context of the

american attack, the perspectives attack. my question is about the aftermath. bruce mengin the lack of the syrian response to the attack on a nuclear reactor. what is the most likely response from syria and hezbollah to expect assad will just sit and think as strategic limited attack or are we to expect a response through an attack on israel and the stabilization of iraq and response to u.s. allies in the region and what is that kind of probable the? what is most likely come in and then what are the next most likely implications of the u.s. strike? >> let's take two more. we will go to the two gentlemen across from each other about halfway back.

>> with the christian science monitor my question is for suzanne. you described to us iran's perspective on syria. i wonder if you could also go a little bit into what role you see iran playing perhaps with concerns about the nuclear program playing in the president's decision as he said that he feels he should take action and syria but also in the decision to go to congress. >> we sent 600 rebel fighters that we trained backend to syria and a lot only were they not welcomed and syria but they were routed by the syrian army. does anybody have any information on that? perhaps you can talk of what we

are up to in jordan these days. >> much of these are much more specific. >> i will try to speak to this in terms of motivating these attacks that we have seen from the administration in the past. clearly it's been articulated by a number of others that this strike will have an important demonstration effect for the iranians to demonstrate the american resolve and to reinforce the norm of the nonproliferation. i believe that is sincere to the president and it has the role in persuading congress to produce the outcome. iran was an easy win when it comes to getting votes on the

hill. it makes sense for the administration to continue to refer back to that issue. clearly the administration and the congress have had a sort of contentious relationship on iran over the course of the past six years. the administration has opposed sanctions that have been considered in overwhelmingly passed by the hill. and then the administration has come back and think the hill for the impact and helping to persuade the iranians to come in and more seriously to the negotiating table. i do believe that it is almost inevitable if the president were to seek authority for the more forceful action against the iranian nuclear program he would have no difficulty in getting it. so why don't worry about any precedents set by the debate that we are seeing today in terms of the result. i think that clearly they

recognize how serious this said that issues is. they don't want to be on the wrong side of the shooting war with washington at this particular moment. and that's why you see a sort of awkward and unusual attempt to at least shift the public rhetoric and a modest way if not to in fact begin to give it away from assad himself. >> either of the two questions remaining. >> i guess i will try to handle the most likely response of syria and hezbollah to an attack. it's difficult thing i've learned in two years of trying to deal with the syrian regime and trying to understand them as i have no idea what the regime is thinking. and i think that speaks for most of us and i don't know why they used chemical weapons in this particular instance because i don't think of was a very smart

move for obvious reasons. and i am wondering to the degree that it might have been an accident. so it's difficult to predict. i think it's very unlikely we will see syria and hezbollah in response to this attack and the reason for that is they have enough problems to be the they have enough enemies within syria to occupy their time and they are not really looking to expand the war to israel or to the united states or even turkey. i think they have shown a consistent pattern of that. i think they do have some escalation options within syria. in particular the contrite more refugees. they can commit more humanitarian atrocities in order

to expose the hypocrisy of the west and attacking the basis of the chemical attacks and they can conceivably challenged the united states or by using more chemical weapons and confusing. they also by the way have many alternatives to turn to be on chemical weapons in terms of conventional weapons for killing people. they haven't used all of their arsenal and they still have places to go to the desolate do think there is a possibility that action will take the civil war bloodier. there is a lot of research that says that typically when there is an outside intervention in the civil war like this it becomes bloody because one side feels the need to step up its game and because other externals supporters feel the need to prop up their side. so that would be my prediction.

>> what is it about the diplomacy? what was the phrase? >> operating on the basis of credibility. >> okay. good. that's the level that i'm on. [laughter] >> you don't have to get to seventh grade because that is basically international relations and politics in the middle east. i do know exactly what assad is thinking. it's a mistake that educated people make. it's more difficult than it is. the hard thing is figuring out what is going on on the ground. once you know that is because they want to win. they want their friends to win and they want us to lose. it's not hard and the tools they have at their disposal to win,

so to use another popular cultural reference all you have to do is watch the sopranos and then understand how they are thinking. why do they use chemical weapons? for two reasons. number one, they suck. they cannot take and hold military. it's shocking the extent to which they suck at the military. so for a year they've been trying to play. they are showing the tanks being blown up in this particular neighborhood of why the fisa -- fsa and the tanks are just sitting ducks. it's incredibly strategic territory because it is the gateway into damascus and

iranian support comes and they failed so they went to the on conventional so it's clear when our military talks about clearing out afghanistan and iraq and so forth with a population center and so on, when assad says this he means it's clear that the whole population act is as simple as that. this is the key to understanding what's going to happen the next day. he is sending a very clear message to all of the syrians who might think of taking up arms against him. you do that. i will wipe you out, like your family out. and don't for a second think the united states, the international community, the u.n. or anybody else is cui to help you. i'm going to show you how tough

i am even when the inspectors are here. the was the message. so that is the attack if it is a one-off attack. he will, verbalize his own population and as he has been doing but he might do other things externally and so on the likely have done the attacks in turkey. they were probably responsible in some way or another for the rockets that went into israel. that is to make us fear there might be. they created hezbollah and want him to win. they don't want to be too supportive of the diet of using chemical weapons because there is all of this hatred out there. on the ground they are supporting. and there is one conversation that never takes place and we

should all think about it. the ayatollah khomeini sits down with the head of the force, the head of the irgc and he says we cannot solve syria. the united states is a super power. the use of force is counterproductive if we use the force in syriac it's going to make it worse, so i think we should forget about it. that conversation never happens. they sit down and say how do we strengthen, how we have massive came to the americans and that's the way the devotee and that's the way we have to do business as well. we don't have to sell syria. our interests are protected our friends, build our friends, punish our enemies, create a framework that allows other people to get on the ground so we don't have to do it. that's international politics. we just have to make our side stronger and cause them paint. >> who is our site?

>> the saudis and the turks. the way you figure out who your site is is who you want to have the most pain and that is iran. we want to make them suffer and make a assad server and then we go down the line and say who isn't going to cause us pain. then we say you are on the other side. >> let me start with the question that was asked for the protection of civilians. there is a genuine humanitarian issue here. what do the syrian people want? they want to stop being slaughtered. i don't think they care for the chemicals of conventional weapons and part of the debate in this city has become kind of lost from reality.

it is a cruise missile strike as we understand being developed by this administration which we are told there are five destroyers in the eastern mediterranean that will fire 250 cruise missiles likely to get us there. i don't think anyone on the panel has said that they are likely to get us there. is it likely that the syrian conflict will be worse in six months after that? i think there is a consensus on the panel that the conflict will be worse in six months. there are no really good options here. let me turn to the question of allies. i mentioned earlier that in -- since 1970's they've had a hostile relationship. there are two occasions when i was different. one was 1990. when the saudis asked us to be the best friend of the syrians to fight saddam hussein and for those of you that remember the flag actually came down pennsylvania avenue as part of the victory parade that didn't

turn out so well. the the people ask of the assad regime is the israeli government. governments like prez and benjamin netanyahu who said we want to make peace with the government. we think the government will be easy to make peace with the and the syrians. why do i mention these points? i wouldn't spend a whole lot of time listening to what the saudis or the israelis have to say about the conflict. their advice has been taken and it's proven to be very good. our new friends in the middle east is a dictator of egypt says don't do it. stay out. you will create a hornet's nest. don't make it worse. i don't think i take his advice either. i don't think he's been to be better at predicting the future of the middle east than his predecessors. but my point is i don't think our allies should be determining the factor on what we do here and should be our interest we

need to hear from the president for the congress votes on national television defining what our national interests are and what is our strategy to get up there not a bunch of stuff about a red line. but the strategy for the accomplishment of our natural interest as he defines it in syriac the if i see the reason that i think we have a hard problem up here articulating all that is that we haven't heard yet from them in the american people want to hear from the most. >> very true. i feel we will stop there. thank you for coming. thank you, everyone. [applause]

the state department this morning ordering non-essential diplomats out of lebanon and urging private american citizens to leave lebanon as the u.s. considers military strikes on the neighboring syria. in a statement in the state department said the trouble warming is because of the potential in lebanon for spontaneous upsurge in violence >> richard baker headed the u.s. senate historical office from its founding in 1975 until 2009.

d.c. that country's economy is not sustainable. speaking at the brookings institution in washington today, he said china has too much corporate debt, too little consumer spending and too much investment in real estate. this is an hour-and-a-half.

>> china remains a source of strength in the interest and to some extent mystery as the second-largest economy in the world and the largest contributor to world growth. in the long as interest happening in china not just within the country but around the world. so this morning we have an extremely distinguished panel to help us on these issues to be on my left is markus rodlauer, the director of the department of the imf and also the mission chief to china. markus studied not just economics but also law and the international relations that makes him perfectly suited for what is happening in the chinese economy but also with the broad implications for the world might be to be on my right, we have stephen roach to spend a long

career at morgan stanley and is one of the most prominent economists in the private sector and now he's jumped to my side of the fence and is a professor at yale university. finally, we have david dollar who until very recently was the u.s. emissary to speak at the embassy in china and he is now also on what i think of as the right side of the fence and is a senior fellow at the center in the global economy and foreign policy at the brookings institution. and before that, he was the head of the world bank office in china to read cities are all people who know china intimately and what we start off with is a presentation by marcus who will tell us a little bit about the main findings of this year's annual report that the imf rights in china and the will give the basis for the discussion and then we will bring in the two panelists and

we will leave sometime at the end for questions and answers. set to begin with, markus. >> good morning and thank you for inviting us here and to speed and my friends who agreed to be on this panel with us here. it's a great honor to be here and thanks to you all for coming. before i start i would like to acknowledge what is done on china and of course it is a team effort. so all of you see today the reports published on the web site. steve is the head of the china division on this division and of course the team has many other members as well. let me start by giving you the main message of the report this year. a lot of concern earlier in the year. we already made it quite

confident that although the growth has been monitoring we don't really see the major risk of the sharp and eminent decline of growth hard line in china. at the same time it has been growing for years and they've continued to grow over the past year and if you compare the town of last year's imf report and this year, and you will detect some heightening concerns about the growing vulnerability is in the chinese economy and the greater urgency to the financial reforms that now must be accelerated to contain the risks and to put this economy on a more sustainable growth path. the growth in that china is much more policy dependent than it is for many other large economies. and the actual growth is very closely linked to what one thinks about as the reactions and how strong will the contract and a decline in the cyclical

risk to growth. so far, quite positively we would say the government has signalled the power for growth in line with its toe in a power which is around 7.5%. so in contrast to the path whenever there was the final slowdown, they would move in quite strongly in the investment and the response has been significantly more moderate. they do not appear to want that to prop up the activity above the target as of last year petraeus of the day they are coming out of china now and the indicators have been monitoring has many of them over 100 through the third quarter to the first three days of august show that activity is indeed stabilizing into the first half of the year. there has been a little bit of slowing retail sales in the double digits and we do not see any decline in 30% now.

so also the trade data have come back somewhat. we are confident that the assessment is there of the growth around 7.5 to 7.75 for the year as a whole is about right. but as i have emphasized since the global crisis a mix of investments, credit and fiscal stimulus has underpinned activity. and while this has been good for china and the world economy, clearly the pattern of growth is not sustainable and it's becoming apparent that it's not sustainable because the signs of the risks are growing. so while there still are significant buffers to the shocks and they are not an eminent crisis mode, safety is clearly diminishing. free risks really jump out.

the financial sector, the vulnerabilities of the local government finances and real-estate. these three risks that jump out at us and we look at the finance of the economy they sort of reflect the deep full devotees underlining problems in the economy along with the current growth which remains based largely on the capitol accumulation and credit financed investment so the risks that we see here reflect the process whereby the capacity is being accumulated ahead of the final consumer demand and it is financed by the credit expansion and this has led the widespread capacity pressure on the vulnerability, diminishing returns to investment and rising corporate and local government debt. as i will discuss to sustain the growth of the economy needs to be transformed we from this pattern of growth based on the

capitol accumulation to one that is more based on the total productivity growth. let's look a bit closer at the financial sector. china's stock of credit on the left hand scale is among the highest in the world on its level of income. you see china and the banking credit is 50% and not only the level that it's extremely fast especially in the bank segment which is not including the left and charge. on the right to see the total social financing as it is called in china with bank credit and credit given outside of the banking channel. the just the gdp in just four years and by the predominant source it still remains in the

banking sector traditionally and increasing the largest share comes through the other channels such as the high yielding product and then on banking sources of the financial. it's very positive in this way because it moves closer to the market and also has tremendous risks in the problem because the places of arbitrage trying to move away from the better regulated banking sector. it's an area of provision where the supervisors have a hard time catching up with what is happening in the so-called shadow banking and the expansion is nearly overwhelming. as of the consequences of what you see here is the explosion of credit is a steady buildup of leverage which is eroding the strength of the financial sector with the local governments and

corporate. so, this combination of leverage and profitability means of course the burdens have also risen and if you look at the average levels in the corporate sector they are still manageable a growing share of the firm's at least those we can see all of those firms that there is data available and they are showing interest coverage ratio. there is a share that again the crisis proportion continuing this recent trend would suggest restraints on the corporate sector and macroeconomically. the second point, local government debt. the bill but then credit has been a large increase in local government debt. infrastructure spending by the local government is an important countercyclical tool in china. a lot of the spending comes from the local government both social and investment and it has become

more so since the financial crisis and a large part of the local government spending and investment spending is being done off budget and isn't recorded as part of the government spending could lead to better assess the macroeconomics feel we have tried to construct what we call and augmented fiscal balance that puts the record it official general government data together with the transactions that are growing committed and of course looking at this together shows us that the actual debt of the public sector, the augmented public sector is much higher than the official one, the 22% official. but the augmented debt including the off budget spending comes to somewhere around 50% of gdp. we have 45 because we don't include something. it is a novel exercise. if you look on the right, this is the sort of market estimates

and even government estimates which have been around the last few years in the size of the government debt in which it is between 50 to 60% depending on what you include on the liability side. and of course the official debt is much higher and means the public deficit if you include the augmented part is much higher than what is measured on the order of one, two or 3% of gdp that the deficit including the off-balance sheet items were as high as 14% during the crisis and have now around eight to 10% of gdp. >> and real-estate on the left-hand side you see that the real-estate now accounts for a very significant share of gdp already.

about 12.5% of output and unemployment about 14% and it is now a key engine of growth. however, one has to realize the distortions on the cycles on the supply side for a financing and real estate developments for growth. on the demand side is prone to bubbles for the private sector given the real deposit interest rates are close to zero and a given the restrictions that say they can't put the money abroad. there is a history of robust capital gains and also a favorable tax treatment so on the demand side there is a huge incentive for demanding the real-estate. so, this is a risky situation and clearly over the medium term

the real estate development will have to slow down to a more sustainable pace as the market matures and the challenge now is to do this in a way not just by of restricting price growth to control it from the top but by removing the interlining distortions that create the incentive to this risk. so as we have said the three risks that are mentioned sit on top of the vulnerabilities on the close model which remains based on the investment capital accumulation. investment implemented through the mix of fiscal government spending, a state-owned enterprise investments but that investment has been used to support domestic activities and offset the internal shock and this has had a policy spillover effect for the global economy and it has the imbalance between

the domestic and consumption it is no longer worsening but it's shift towards the low consumer based economy has yet to occur. for example, last year the investment rules as a percent of gdp rise and remain flat is a share of gdp. the urban household savings rate has increased rather than falling which would mean more consumption. so it remains an out lawyer with the investment as a share of gdp much higher than the consumption much lower than in other countries. on the right-hand side we can see from the supply side china's growth and the secondary effect remains the main driver of growth over the whole past

decade. these are the economic imbalances china has to grapple with the net's growth pattern and we must not forget about the other challenges and other aspects of rebalancing and of the challenge which is for example they would rather help in the major reduction of poverty in china over the past years. inequality of the same time has increased tremendously over the past two decades. and if you look at the staff report we have a chart in there that shows how much it has actually increased in the past two decades with the largest increase. the environmental challenge is adding factors of production and investment and resource intensive growth are tremendous and not sustainable so clearly the time is running out on the current growth model.

we have done an accounting exercise that assesses and analyzes what this source of the past three decades and is clearly mainly a factor putting labor and new factories together and producing for exports. clearly this growth can no longer continue. if it continues, then we see the orange line here on the bottom is china. if this continues it can go on a few more years but will run out of steam and eventually you will create too much excess capacity with enterprise and profitability and bad loans to rise and there will either be a crisis or a sharp slowdown and china's convergence process which is the ratio of china's the five gdp to the u.s. which has continuously and steadily over the past three decades. the rest is it might simply stalled as it has actually done for the middle-income economies

at that stage of development. so, the choice for china the challenge is either to change its growth model and sustain the process if there is a successful shift in the model to the productivity growth it can continue to converge closer towards the advanced income levels. what are the key policies? the raleighs costs explaining the details in our report. now there's a decisive new round of reforms. but we combine to unleash the new sources of growth which are based on productivity growth and at the same time that we need to address these growing risks in the various parts of the economy, and at the same time it makes growth more inclusive and more environmentally sustainable and not diminish the challenge. all of this of course is in the

excellent environment which very likely will remain difficult at least for some years to the answer, the challenge is tremendous. it may entail over the next few years a somewhat slower growth in china. not in the eight, nine, 10% range but somewhat slower. it is clearly a trade-off is worth making. what is the strategy? at the strategic level i think it would highlight three points. an increasing role to the market forces and continued liberalization and reduce government involvement. stronger governments, and that's very important as we mentioned this as we increase the level of the market forces we need to see stronger governments at the low level of the government collects a lower level of the economic union, local governments, state owned enterprises and state banks. and at the same time, shifting and come towards households and

increasing consumption so these are the three strategic promise and the economic policies for the exchange rate and other measures that need to be taken over the next three or four years. many of these reform directions and policy objectives have indeed been outlined in the government's recent announcements so we are confident in our dialogue that we do see a great recognition of the challenge, the clear understanding of the policy areas that need to be addressed and the direction the policy needs to take and we have seen it in the various announcements that have come back the next six months. what is needed is clear and specific policy measures and timely and focused implementation. so let me sum up again without the key takeaways. the near-term outlook in china we are confident growth 7.5%

maybe even slightly higher. but the full one of the these are growing. and while the margins are still there they are diminishing and the financial and structural reforms must be accelerated to come to the risks and to form the growth model. thank you. >> let me start with you, david. you have been back from beijing for just a few weeks. do you agree with markus's assessment of the medium term prospects and specifically do you think what he laid out in terms of what china needs on the policy reforms do you have anything to add or to subtract? ..

and investment as a share of gdp compared other countries. china is extraordinary. it has very, very hot investment, very, very low private consumption. we haven't seen this before. on the investment side if you invest 50% of gdp at this stage he basically double the capital stock in six years. so that means doing this big investment push of recent years that capital stocks have doubled. if the model continues it will be doubled again and suggest. there's evidence the return to investment is dropping and so i'm convinced if you double capital stock looking forward to

next six years, there's not going to be demand to use that capital stock. you will run into some kind of financial or fiscal problems and imf report brings that out. i just want to emphasize i think that's quite serious. i agree with the reform agenda that was touched upon. i would add to areas i also think are important. the first is reforming the household legislation system. if you look at china, there's been some rural urban migration but it's rather limited if you can bear to the a struggle experience of other countries. if you include the migrants, china's urbanization rate is about 52% when south korea was at the same level of per capita income, the urbanization rate had already reached 68%. so the household system restricts mobility and one result is china has a very large rural urban income difference. and by restricting the ability of migrants to move to the city to restrict the ability of many

rural people to move and fight higher income. it's declared difficult for people to bring their families, to bring their children, old people and if they did move to cities that would provide quite a bit of additional demand for social services. the government would have defined the resources for those so they would be challenges. but if you're thinking about shifting from such an investment driven model to a more consumption driven model, i think beating up on the system and encouraging more real migration of families from the countryside to the city enable people to find higher income and consume more and encourage greater provision of government services. the other area i would briefly mention is state enterprise reform. if china still has a large state enterprise sector, we can argue exactly how big that is. but the officials to assist x. it takes more than 40% of investment of recent years has been in the state-owned sector.

there's a lot of enterprises with mixed ownership so that's probably a low estimate. state enterprise got the upper in quantities sectors but i see them as being especially visible in modern services like financial services, media, telecom, logistics, airlines. these are all sectors in which there's a small number of state-owned incumbents. chinese often refer to these as the monopolistic sectors. these firms earn a lot of profits or perhaps we would call it economists would call the rent they pay very little dividend to the government. the nice thing in the imf report, that statistic that in recent years, centrally owned state enterprises have paid 0.4% of dividends into the central government budget. so basically you have a system in which protected enterprises earn profit and they reinvest it, creating a heavy bias

towards investment in the system. if you took more of that income into the government budget, just a simple reform, and expand the social services that would be shifting some resources from investment to consumption. my general point is there are important institutional features in the chinese system that encourage investment and discourage consumption. so as a look at transformation and the model, it makes sense to target some of those reform areas. i strongly agree with the report that the financial system, the repressed financial system is an area for reform, but i'm also adding the labor market institutions and the state enterprise institutions as important areas for reform. so we look to the new leadership. i look to the new leadership hoping that there will be some relatively bold reforms that are announced over the next few months to tackle these issues comprehensively. >> thank you, david. steve, you are the private sector guru on china, and your

views are carefully watched by everybody. you generally tended to be much were optimistic about china both in terms of its prospects and its ability to undertake reforms. do you share about the endpoint about where china ought to go? >> i do, eswar, and i, like david, i really commend markus and steve and the team for once again laying out a very comprehensive assessment of the agenda that china faces in trying to lever -- deliver on this important and critical growth transformation. the only bone i would really pick with the assessment, markus, i honestly in keeping with what you, you know, the sort of billing you just gave

me, eswar, is the opposite. i would prefer to call much of these issues, many of these issues you raised, challenges rather than risks. i think in assessing the prospects for any major economy in the world today, we could point to a broadening of risks for every single one of these economies that are equal to if not more severe than the ones that you outlined for china, including the united states, europe, and the new poster child for economic revival, japan. there's a lot of risk. every single one of these economies today. the one area that i would just pick up on, and i really agree with the point that david made on the as we reform, but i'm a little but on the other side of the issue that you raised with respect to investment and the

doubling of the capital stock. marcus kinsey under team, and you pointed this out to me before, pointed out that this capital stock growth in china, while its high, in consistent with the high in this mature, the levels of the stock is low, especially in looking at capital per worker, which is what economists refer to look at as the driver of long-term productivity growth. so i'm not nearly as worried about rapid growth in the capital stock as many are. i recognize that lack a market-based system of capital allocation that there are some areas to be very critical in the way in which that capital is allocated but i want to see this capital labor ratio continue to rise off a very low base, and i

think that is going to happen in light of the point you made on urbanization. urbanization is a capital intensive endeavor. there's a lot more organization to go. you made the korea point. china is at 52.6% last year on the urban share. probably ahead of 70% over the next 10 to 15 years, and that's got to require a lot more capital. final point i would make is that in looking at progress on rebalancing, and i have to give a lot of credit to my friend, nickel lardy, who has really written a lot on chinese rebalancing and developing, indicators to gauge the progress of rebalancing. my view is that sort of the last

thing that tells you that the economy is rebalanced used to look at the major shares of the big sources of demand like consumption, investment, exports and the like. i prefer to look at the building blocks that drive those shares as early warning signs. and one of the ones that i am most encouraged about, and dick has got as one of his components of this rebalancing gauge is the accelerated growth in the services sector. i think it's impressive right now, ma and get a chart in their, markus, you showed us it just shows the shares through 2012. but if you look at the growth rates of those shares of the sectors, in the first half of this year the service sector has

grown by chinese data 8.3%, whereas the secondary our manufacturing construction sector has grown 7.6%. so there's a positive gap of about 27% relative to the big traditional engine. -- .7%. manufacturing, construction has grown on average for 30 years 2.7 percentage points faster than services. now it's flipped flopped where services are going about .7% faster. it's six moscow you don't know if it's going to be sustained but i like the fact that you're beginning to see very early signs of growth momentum shift to this tertiary or services sector, which is less resource intensive, more labor intensive, more environmentally friendly,

and allows the economy to grow at a slower rate, and still achieve a lot of labor of china's daunting labor absorption of justice. china's got a lot of challenges, and if you want to push me, i would say risks. we do, too. i don't see us addressing our challenges and risks nearly as aggressively as i do in china. thank you. >> thank you, steve. i knew i could count on you for the optimistically shaded you agenda. you talked about how you anticipate growth being seven, 7.5%. what do you see it as a worst-case scenario for china? because the rest of the world gives a great deal about what happens to china, but you see a remains unfavorable. if these reforms don't get put into place, although more medium-term issue, do you think there is a prospect of growth slowing very sharply? to the have enough space to

respond to that? spent in the near term we don't see that. i think the authorities have the policy levels to respond to contingencies. there are downside risks to the excitement environment, but as we've seen, domestic demand picking up quite stronger and could probably be picking up even more. when you say 7.5, we see 7.5 plus for this you. near-term, you know, short of an outlying calamity that we don't envision, we don't see major risks of a chance to slow down. >> what about the short term, fairly secure? >> i agree that the authorities have enough physical space to keep growth that 7.5% or a little bit higher. to me, the risk build up over the medium term. growth is going to be at about that rate, and the question then is, is there going to be rebalancing that puts that on a sustainable path for the long-term? or is it going to be the only

growth model for a few more years? risks are building up and you get something unpredictable in the world and you can imagine a rather sharp growth slowed down but i wouldn't expect that in the near term. >> since we're the short term, let's turn back to the medium-term. we talked about china having enough physical space to respond in the short term. but has correctly pointed out there are lots of problems when you take the overall fiscal accounts in the country, it's not just the central government that looks very benign, but once you stood adding in countries liability, the local governments, debt and so, it starts looking a lot more bleak. so on the fiscal front, do you see major risks in doing to build up and really holding back long-term growth? stephen, would you like to think -- take that? >> i think, eswar, it's really interesting to look at china's response in terms of fiscal policy to the current slow down, which i agree with david and

markus. and actually do. you haven't divulged your position yet. we were talking earlier and i will tell the script, you are probably very optimistic near-term. but there was a slow down over the last couple of years that if you look at china's policy response to earlier slow downs, a pretty strong fiscal stimulus and they didn't do it. they have done a little bit in the margin, but they're willing to accept slower growth and they're trying to wean the economy off these major construction spending, infrastructure high packages. and, of course, you know, the biggest one is they have engaged or indulged in was the one after the crisis in late 2008 or early '09. so whether you call this fiscal deleveraging or just a more

prudent, cautious, disciplined approach, both -- and i would add monetary policy. i think this is a striking contrast of this new leadership relative, basically the two generations we've seen previously. now, it's only on in the leadership, but they do not want to go back to debt intensive growth. that's not to say that your first question is the time disaster scenario. if china classes for reasons or its environs classes for reasons that we're not figured out they will go back to another big stimulus. but markus rules that out and i agree that is unlikely. highly unlikely. and so i think there is a lot of focus in dealing with the debt intensive strain of economic growth, especially for the shadow banking system in the wealth management products, the

non-bank institutions that are now really coming under heightened scrutiny by the financial regulators. >> that's a good segue into the next issue i would like to raise. markus, you talked about how the reforms is financial system reform. i think there's agreement on this belt that to achieve this balance growth over the long term to get the economy onto a more sustainable growth, you need a better financial system. they have been making progress on that dimension. just a few weeks ago, they moved the floor on lending rates, just today, yesterday in beijing. they announced they are reopening the governor bond pictures markets. so they seem to be taking steps in the right direction towards liberalizing financial markets but do you see this as significant progress? >> i think it is progress.

it has been progress. let's not forget that they're looking today at a financial sector that is already different from what it was five or 10 years ago. all this private activity going on. free lending rates today. we have margins around deposit rates. so think about progress has been made. now going forward, we clearly see the need to make a decisive break into a totally market-based financial system. and for that we need a number of things. we need liberalized interest rates. i mentioned that first even though i myself always want to say for you to be able to liberalized interest rates, and actually thereby achieve what you want to achieve, which is a market-based competitive financial system. you need not choose liberalized interest rates but you also need entities that are able and willing to compete on a market-based system, which means you need the financial

constraints and discipline, then has to come from an ability and willingness to take risks, but also a punishment if i take the wrong kind of risks. which means that investors who make bad investment decisions because they take to high returns for two risky business has to be able to go broke and lose money. banks or savers to intermediate, inefficient in an overly competitive way have to be resolved out of the market in a transparent and clear way, which means you need deposit insurance on the other and. also irresolution framework for those who complete to aggressively. you need to remove the current moral hazard in a system that basically all deposits and virtually all fixed term investments have been guaranteed, but so far we haven't seen failure of one

single fixed interest instrument. there's a perception that virtually everything here is guaranteed. and so these things have to change for liberalized interest rates would work effectively and not a race new risks of crisis with seen in the united states, what liberalizing great in the savings and loan and everyone else in the world. liberalizing too early and too quickly without supportive reforms underground that actually make it work is very risky. continued progress in to work for the position but that's not the end all be all. they also need to be true reforms in the banking system, true framework, strengthening of the monetary system so that instead of controlled deposit interest rates, we will have a new anchor in the system, a new policy rate. so it's a whole host of reforms that need to move together. rather than looking for one big

headline i look for a consistent, coherent approach that lays out the steps, what are we going to do over the next two, three years to achieve what we need to achieve urgently, which is a truly market-based system. >> nicely laid out what economists would like to see, a little minicrisis that can be managed. that is risky. the government seems to understand that there is an alternative financial market reform. do both of you see this proceeding and the right direction? ducey big risks to the reforms, and what other things you think they should do up front? david. >> there's a lot of talk in beijing recently about liberalizing the capital account very dramatically. and, frankly, i'm kind of surprised. i think markus alluded to this. there's definitely risk moving quickly to liberalized that capital account when of institutional features are not in place. one thing i would introduce into the discussion is, i think opening up foreign investment

and financial services is related to opening the capital account that is a different issue. china has rather restrictive system in terms of openness to foreign investment and financial services. it's pretty much the most restrictive of the g20 countries, for example. in general, opening up the finances of the investment and trade strengthens the financial system. i think that the sequencing issue is hotly being debated in china. i think should be debated. i would personally favor opening up financial services. i agree with the point about liberalizing interest rates. china has done a lot. there's room for china to move more on liberalizing interest rates. i would think opening up the capital account would come later in this sequence, but as i said, there seems to be an active debate in china about moving ahead more quickly on liberalizing the capital accounts. >> cannot comment on that? actually it's more of a

question. maybe, you're not just a moderator. you are a real live expert on china made i can ask you a question, if i might. [laughter] >> you know, modern china got going, you know, late '70s, early '80s with reforms and opening up done shopping, progress reforms implemented by former premier. reforms with the driver, aggressive risk reforms that took on huge risks both internal and external political risk. do you think china has forgotten what they got out of reforms? have they grown so rapidly? have they gotten so strong, has the power structure coalesced

around state-owned enterprises and the sort of local government fiefdoms, where it's really hard for them to go back and replicate the intensity of reform that we saw in the early stages of this post deng xiaoping era speed is a big only question permitted to the moderator. so thanks for the question. that's of course a very perceptive question based on your very deep understanding of the history of reforms in china. my sense is that china is now a much more complex economy and the low hanging fruit in terms has been plucked already. china is now at a stage where there is an inability reform to be moving for but also each of these reforms carry enormous risk. you can very well laid out what the first ought to be in terms

of freely functioning financial mark with market disciplines. you know that doesn't a casino. and for china especially given initial conditions starting with poor legal framework, or institutional framework, the risks on the part to the input of a significant. but having said that, my optimism comes from the fact that the chinese are very effective i think it using external triggers, and also good news kids for reform. the external triggers have been used in order to sort of shake free the domestic obstacles. but having said that, the question is how do you manage to get around the enormous political opposition because the system was very well. particularly powerful people. i think the chinese have been very clever at creating this narrative. if you think about capital accounts, the notion of big and important country having a big

and important terms in the world economy is not ultimately an end in itself but it does create the right sort of momentum for domestic reforms. it forces you to think, what do you need to do domestically in order to have the kind of world power question the battle markets, open accounts, better legal framework. so that's one narrative. earlier this year they announced a plan to reduce inequality. usually when the government says they want to reduce inequality, that's a very bad idea. but with a limited specifics of that plan work, let's reform the state-owned enterprises, let's liberalized interest rates, let's undertake some reforms in the labor market. so these are all the right things to do. but once you say these are going to benefit the markets, i think it's a much more effective ways for getting around the obstacles. i think they have their hearts in the right place. >> great answer, thank you.

>> let's go back to traditional role. once again, you have given us a very good segue, stephen, into what we should be thinking about. you talk about what reforms are needed. and markus, the fact that those have talked about this in their own five year plan. but it does take political will. do you sense that there is political but right now among the senior leadership to get around the reforms? maybe we start with you, markus. in other words, they know what they need to do. are they prepared to take the price and take the risk of doing it? >> i think we will see over the next six months. [laughter] who knows? >> i think there is political rhetoric, and it's stronger in addressing this issue than we've seen in a long time coming out of the senior leadership. i mean, it started literally the day that xi jinping first

addressed the media after being appointed general secretary of the party. but in a rhetoric and actions are two different things. so it is this very important central committee meeting in november that will really put down some important markers in judging whether there is teased to the rhetoric, teeth to the types of reforms that you really did an excellent job of describing, eswar. some people, and there have been some commentary pieces written recently about the significance of this third plant of the center committee in november, comparing it with the third plan

of, i want to say the 11th center committee meeting back in 1978, which was the platform for deng xiaoping to really put down what, in retrospect, were historic markers for the transformation. so we will see. tragedies as it is right. we will know i think in a surprisingly short period of time as to whether not this is rhetoric or a plan for action. >> let me push a little bit on this, steve, because you have -- if you're asked to sort of defined the stephen roach action plan for china, what with a key out of his be that you would like to see in there? >> services is one because it's

a critical building block of the consumer transformation that i alluded to earlier. urbanization, as david has alluded to, is also important. because of the reason he mentioned. huge income leverage provided, and the third one is one we haven't really talked about today, but it is really making the social safety net in china far more robust. the focus thus far has been on the number of people enrolled in the retirement plans, nationally or locally, or the number of people covered by the wayside universal -- quasi-universal health care plan. but the benefit levels are pathetically low. so these plans are in massive

need of an injection of funds. and if you don't do that, you can generate a lot of labor income, that it won't be spent. it will be saved, and you know, the point that markus made on the rising urban saving rate is an example of fear driven precautionary saving in the absence of a robust and secure safety net. self services, urbanization, safety nets. >> david, from your perch at u.s. treasury engaging your work very closely with the senior chinese leadership. what is your sense of whether they have the stomach for reforms? >> i think expectations are so high that they will definitely come out with some reform plan in the fall that will touch on probably all of the elements that we have raised. so i think they will announce something that sounds pretty good that may very well not be a

lot of detail in some key areas. i agree with colleagues up here that is out of going to be six bus or longer until we know have very serious they are. but one way to look at this is there going to announce something and they're going to sears we pursue reform in most of these areas that we are talking about. is being china, they're probably not going to do anything radical it and you yourself, eswar, talked about some of the risks involved in reform that you to think hard about what you want to encourage them to do a lot of radical things quickly. they're going to have reforms. they won't be radical. they will roll out gradually. we will see be balancing. antennae, the interesting question is, will be whether this is fast enough reform to really put them on a sustainable path, or whether or not some external shock or the build up of these vulnerabilities whether it will derail the. i don't see how anyone can confidently predict that because there's so many variables involved but it is going to be

fascinating to watch over the next few years whether you get gradually form, gradually balancing that succeeds, or whether you end up with some kind, more of a dislocation. >> these external triggers, one of the things that's been discussed is the bilateral investment treaty. what do you see as the prospects of that becoming reality? do you think that will help again to shake free some of the political structures in china that could help move along reforms? >> that's a very good question. so if you followed our economic dialogue between u.s. and china this year, one of the important outcomes was an agreement to move ahead seriously to try to negotiate a bilateral investment treaty between china and the u.s. this is a significant because it would require from the chinese side liberalizing a lot of sectors toward foreign investments that are not currently liberalize. i mentioned financial services. many of the other sectors i mentioned would have to be opened up to direct foreign

investment much more so than they are now. this could become kind of an important anchor for one aspect of china's reform. china, in turn, feels its investment is often not welcome in the united states so china is looking at a vat and asking whether this will do a more secure investment and more secure environment for growing chinese investment in the united states pics as i so very much potential for a win-win ingredient to be difficult to negotiate the details but i predict it'll take at least a year but to me is going to be one of the signals about whether the leadership is really serious about reform, if they can bring that about, that would be quite important both as a signal and as a real structural reform. >> how likely is that to get through the u.s. congress? >> you probably can answer that better than me. i've been living in beijing for the last nine years, but i do think, you know, i think a good i let her investment treaty would create benefits for both

sides, u.s. business interest would definitely be behind it. do you agree with that? >> when it comes to getting something for the u.s. congress, which is, you know, fearful of anything associated with the chinese, this will be very difficult. i agree with the significance and the importance of pushing ahead on a bilateral investment treaty. it would be absolutely phenomenal, but i look at this, all the handwringing over this deal involving pigs, and the senators claiming that this cuts right to the heart of the food security in the united states. [laughter] and they accuse them of floating

15,000 pigs down the river and shanghai, when they have no pic farms anywhere near that river. it's absurd. >> so you think that it was not going to go through? >> no. they sent signals that it looks like, fingers crossed, it will go through. >> let's set that aside and turn away from such interesting topics. since we're on the subject of washington i want to get your disappointing the imf has thought of for a long time, which is the chinese currency regime. things have start stabilized, they have widened the band of flexibility around the renminbi. used as his as a big priority because one has a great deal about how chinese move forward and is that still a priority speak with absolutely. while the discussion about the level of exchange rate has been

diminished, china has appreciated in terms by about 40% since it started opening up its system in 2005. even this year in the face of a slow economy, of a risky -- they have appreciated by about six or 7%. it's not the issue of the level, but click the exchange will be tightly managed and even though there is a band of inconsistent -- you can consist of a seed exchange rate, for example, so it is a tightly managed and i think if you want to truly liberalize the capital account, if you want to truly open up the financial sector, you need a more flexible exchange rate system. which means the exchange rate can go either way. but less intervention, less management, gradually for the opening up the band but then also gradually sucks the teachings within the bank of how you set the root reference or everyone after him each one in

the bands the previous day. that gives you more leeway to the exchange rate to act as a shock absorber if you sudden flows of capital in an outcome the exchanges is very important to both to help manage the bands of payments, to absorb shocks that come extra, but also to foster with greater market orientation and markets domestically. i think it is a key priority in the agenda. >> i suspect you have and have begins. stakeout to ask you about this view. do you think this is still a priority? just from china's on interest, as markus is laid-back and you think think it's a priority no? >> the point on the cushion, the buffer is very important. and if china commits to increasing market-based

transformations, having a flexible currency is an important part of the adjustment mechanism for any market-based economy. they know that they have banished it a good deal higher -- managed into good deal higher over the last, what, eight years. but the management and market-based flexibility are two different things. they're going in the right direction, and there's no doubt in my mind that's why they're headed. there's a number of pieces that fall into place before they get there. >> both of you talked about urbanization as something that the government is keen on and is promoting. given what you said, steve, about with extensive social safety net, and daily commute document issued with the labor market, do you see organization as an end in itself?

given the support, is urbanization eventually sort of a guerrilla for other reforms that they need to do? about the hopi urbanization project itself will accomplish? why it is so important to them? >> i'm thinking of a number of underlying reforms but i already mentioned who go reform. -- hookah reform. they mentioned bring up a larger issue of reform in china. they turned to land sales which is inherently an unsustainable path of revenue raising. i think intergovernmental fiscal reform finishes at local government has the resources they need to provide social services, as steve mentioned what is essentially entitlement reform in china, reform of the pension system and some of the labor contributions which are very high. i mentioned hookah reform. so to me as a set of reform that would tend to make the economy

more efficient and that i think would have the effect of leading to more urbanization. but i see it as a result of people's choices and not so it is a deliberate directed effort. i think that's an important distinction. there is a debate in china but not by the pattern of urbanization and future come and some voices would like to create whole largest cities in the center of the country. most farmers now live in the center of the country. so you can imagine building a lot of cities in the center, take a lot of capital investment. so that would be a channel for investment over the next few years. but the risk is that these will not be efficient platforms of production. i would prefer to free things up and i predicted to a lot of people move to the existing coastal cities where productivity is very high. chinese cities are small in many ways as there's room for more people to move to the city. there will be need for more investment but it should be a less intensive path. >> someone who lived in china for as long as you have, you

want more people in those big city? >> i want more people but more -- >> you didn't have to worry. you had a car. >> just in my nine years, the traffic time increased fourfold for me. it increased fourfold for me basin and nine-year period but that's a rational pattern that is infringed use of automobiles under investing in public transportation. beijing as a roughly flat city. there's a lot of potential to build that much more dense cities in china. there's going to be a lot of policies involved, but there's room for a lot more people to move to coastal cities in china. spent just quickly, the urban share of th of the chinese by bn 1980 was slightly less than 20%. 2012, 52.6. it is headed up to 70, and by 2030. in 50 years this is the most

dramatic urbanization we have seen. is there any and? no way. there's a transitional shift from a peasant society to hopefully a more modern, higher productivity economy. in the article for report that markus and the team put out, they stressed the critical transition between extensive and intensive growth in china was -- with the latter being an economy that focuses increasingly on an increase in total factor productivity. so the transition that we're talking about, this is a factor accumulation story, and it's not a sustainable story. so the agenda shifts dramatically. and now with more than, well more than half the urbanization behind china, the focus really needs to be on this intensive

productivity story, as you guys described very well in this report. >> another thanks to a panelist. i'm sure that our burning questions among those in the audience. we have time for a few questions. please identify yourself, and no commenting lease. if you can address a particular panelist. >> thank you. i'm jennifer lee. my question is about the global capital. so given that you 20 the chinese emphasize that the fed should be cautious on -- [inaudible] the impact on the economy will be less than other immigrant countries. do you still see through be an impact if the facts are doing any move? the second is, we have seen in

emerging countries, will they be the statement situation later this year? thank you. >> yeah, look, qb was an accident waiting to happen for the u.s. and for global markets. and we're seeing the accident right now. and the good news for china is it's not getting hit, in large part because it's running a current account surplus. the current account developing markets in the developing world, india, brazil, turkey, south africa with big deficits that are getting really hit hard to these are countries that were lax in addressing their own structural problems during these five years of free money, courtesy of yield seeking

capital flows sparked by hud. and with a yield arbitrage now swinging back to the united states, those loans are leaving quickly, and for a country that needs extra funding, and china is not one. they are answer is trouble. this is a big destabilizing event for current account deficits developed economies have been inattentive to the reform agendas. >> good morning. my name is arnold and i've been teaching the past 10 years. i hear my father-in-law complained about the cost of food in the wet market and difficult to find a better place for him to live, so for the and so on. so i wonder about the impact of the slow down on a population in china that has been a custom to 30 years of relative high growth

without much sacrifice, especially now that the talk of reform seems to be accompanied by an increased crackdown on dissent and criticism. >> if you look at the pattern of growth over the past, which was relying made on capital accumulation, it was holding back wages, to be frank. and it of course provided a tremendous shift of rural populations to be more productive. but if you look at the actual average wage growth it has been very small compared to the amount of resources that has been spent on investment and other things. you would think that part of this is precisely to improve the livelihood of the population by shifting more of the fruits of growth to more household

increase, towards consumption. that comes from a variety forms by raising wages, raising social benefits allowing -- activities to service in the cities opening up opportunities for small-scale service expansion, et cetera. so we see information act to benefiting income distribution and equality and income in the lower levels, much more than the current growth patterns. >> i'm albert camus atlantic council and u.s. treasury department to i want to follow up on what markus was talking about, wages falling. and ask a question about your outlier diagram. issued china as an outlier in

its share of investment of gdp, but the cluster of countries are not really very stellar performers. and so you're really criticizing china or being outside sort of this club of failure. and if you look at, and i read your article before the summer and attitude in which the leading comment is, per capita household income declined for much of the last decade. i'm sure that's a typo. income has not decline. share has declined income has been growing at 10, eight to 10% in real terms. so i think there needs to be a voice of sober reevaluation of the report enter comments major conclusions that china is facing these volatilities. the non-bank financial growth is 60%. well, over four years, the nominal economy grew 65% over

four years. so the share decline. i wonder if you can comment. it seems to me there's a bias in the report trying to look for trouble in an economy where government may need to optimize markets pretty heavily as many of you pointed out. it's doing very well, and it's being compared to sort of pretty poor performance. >> yeah, i think that goes partly back i think what steve also mentioned. there's an issue about levels. it's obvious that capital is too brittle. i think what we're talking really is about the speediness of the capacity. when you invest have to income, when you grow your financial sector i 60% of gdp over four years, when you have periods of credit growth of 60, 70, 80% in some sectors even 100%, with

supervision that is at best trying to catch up, i think you just have to look obligate at your speedometer and say, wait a moment, maybe we need to look at again at the risks we are building. you're looking at a sector that in some areas of course we cannot speak about a real estate sector of china. it doesn't exist. it is hugely diverse. it has economy four times as large as europe. there are vast amounts of bubbles. but even of supply. and excess demand. but then you look at the speed of growth. you look at the speed of critical as and you just have to say, in general, these are signals that point to increasing risks of a calamity. and you need to be careful not to over extend yourself. >> i am from voice of america. there have been a series of

issues, price fixing issues. the european report yesterday said the phone companies believe they're being unfairly targeted by government pros. i wonder if you could talk about the possible intention of the chinese government about doing so? thank you. >> does anybody want to take that? no, nobody. spent it's not really part of -- >> it is not really part of the economic group discussion. >> i am a former general counsel of the senate banking committee saw wanted to talk about that b.i.t. issue that came up. and explain some of the concern and ask steve whether this is a realistic concern. we've run around $3 trillion worth of trade deficits with china. since they join the wto.

they now have about $3.420 worth of foreign currency reserves. much of the investment coming in the united states from china is from state owned party controlled enterprises. so that's why some in the congress have a concern because traditionally we have not wanted our own government owning chunks of our economy. is it a legitimate concern to be worried that the chinese, state owned enterprise, party controlled, widowed chunks of our economy? and the fact that the chinese now have so much in way of foreign currency reserves, that could be a pretty good chunk of our economy over time. >> steve, i would like you and also david to comment on this given your background. >> my view is that those concerns are a photo for our inability to accept our own responsibility for an unprecedented shortfall of

national savings, and the need to run to import surplus savings more broad to fund the growth in our economy, and the requisites to run massive account deficits to attract foreign capital. last year, 2012, america ran trade deficits with 102 countries in the world. china was the largest. by higher math, that leaves 101 other countries. so we have a massive multilateral problem because we don't save. china's high lateral deficit with the united states is large but it's hugely distorted by supply chain dynamics that puts china in the role as being in a similar a lot of inputs from

other countries in asia and elsewhere of final goods that are shipped out. your point on recycling chinese foreign exchange back into dollar-based assets, basically the implication of your comments is that we would like china to buy our treasuries because we don't want to control our deficit, but stay away from our companies. i don't think we can have it both ways. if we don't like chinese accumulation of u.s. assets, whether they are fixed were financial, then we need to act more responsibly as a nation, save more, and come back on our deficits in the federal sector as was in the household sector. >> my reaction to the question

is that right now a chinese ownership of real assets in the united states, the productive assets, is rather minor. and then frankly u.s. ownership of productive assets in china is also relatively minor. so we can negotiate a treaty that would enable significantly more two-way investment, and i'm convinced that would be a good deal for both the united states, for china, and for the world economy. whether or not we can negotiate that is an important question, but that would be part of the bilateral investment. china would have to open up more sectors and then the united states would have to do more welcoming in sectors that go well beyond treasury bills. my second reaction is that, as you know the united states has a careful system in place, the so-called committee on foreign assessment and use that looks at national strategic issues involving any investment. a bilateral investment treaty --

>> pork, right? [laughter] >> it -- it reviews a relatively small number of transactions each year, as steve knows. that essentially is not touched by b.i.t. basically. take a look at the national security implications of an investment including countries with which the united states has signed a bilateral investment treaty. >> [inaudible] >> you should know that the chinese companies asked city is to review the transaction. said he is did not go out and grab the transaction to review it. the chinese company asked him to review that transaction. >> is that that's because i'm just pointing out. they didn't go out and seize it and look at it. the chinese company asked him to review. i was involved in writing the statute in 1990 as i follow the very closely. >> we don't have much time left. let me take for five question and then the panels will have a chance to respond collectively

and offer closing remarks. >> maybe, probably a fundamental question. considering the climate change, carbon emissions and correlaticorrelati on between gdp and carbon emissions, is there any hope for zero growth model? >> hi. as david mentioned earlier we know that there's a serious imbalance in the local and central government budgets in china. so my question is, is there a 10 from beijing to address this imbalance? and if we don't see any changes to it, will you be more worried about the local government ability? thank you.

>> i've taught environmental science for a couple of years, a decade ago. and i want to ask a question that was asked before. there's an increasingly important water shortage because all across northern china, because of the shrinking of the himalayan glaciers, of the yellow river has a water shortage part of the year. the aquifers are being depleted in the north. the gobi desert is spreading, and i wonder then what would be the longer-term impact of lack of agricultural products all across the north, and the need for china to be more dependent for its food on other countries? >> hi. matthew pierce from four seasons hotel. to build off her and his

questions, how can i phrase this? what is the standing committees thinking? presumably they have an economic strategy that we see the crackdown. there in total disagreement with the thought of liberalization. you see the crackdown on foreign companies. we see state enterprise growing. aside from the free trade sending develop in shanghai, i don't see any agreement. resume with have read your report. what are they thinking? what are the strategies? >> we will take one last question. >> thank you. i have a question. wonder why pvos he is so afraid of depreciation. fo..

okay. so i wanted to grab the to natural resources related questions, at least two questions. yeah. it came out in the discussion with the rebalancing that we've all talked about. this should be a less natural resource intensive path so should help china with air pollution, for example, carbon emissions. we will see carbon emissions peak in china and the question

is what pete and equine by 2020 or start to decline by 2013 and there will have a significant impact for china and the rest of the world. so the have we are talking about is the resource saving path that includes the water. urban living is more intensive primarily because the rural living is based on agriculture. it's interesting for china and they should say that it's rational for china to import significantly more food. china can feel food self-sufficient and still import significantly more food than it does now and that would help china deal with its water situation. migration also matters because the southern part of china is and so water scarce and the northern part is very water scarce so rationally millions of people should move from the north to the south and if you free of the system that will be possible whereas more partial reform allows people to move by a nearby city is not going to

address that kind of water issue. >> i agree with everything david said. those are a broad range of topics. the only thing i can add is don't forget about the south water transfer projects. they are moving the water up north, too. but i guess the point i would like to in bonn is the point i began with, and that is it's more of a rhetorical question. why is it that we in the united states continue to view china through the lens of risks and catastrophes and threats and things that are about to go wrong? gordon wrote this book the coming disaster -- the coming crash of china about the collapse 15 years ago.

and he is still out there with his website saying it's going to come any day now. what is it about us in the united states that continues to see china as the threat that we do what is it about us that uses that perceived threat as a foil to prevent us from doing a lot of heavy lifting in our own structural and bilateral agenda with china and of what is it about us that use this time as a lightning rod to deflect attention from the congressional and policy agenda every couple of years that there is an election. so i don't have an answer to that, but it's an important question that we need to think about pretty carefully.

>> markus? >> three points quickly. the environment tries to look at that. we do see tremendous growth. there is a potential to shift the investment from nowhere but maybe parks and other things moving a factory from the inside of the city to somewhere else and making it cleaner. i think there's a huge potential there. the local government is a threat. but our judgment is coming under control. we are quite confident that the unchecked growth of liabilities and problems and the risks are being managed at the same time reforming as david said the whole government relations. it's a very complex problem and will take years to accomplish. i don't see them to be afraid of the depreciation.

i think at some point they would like the exchange rate to depreciate, which would help invest the bet so it shows more that there is a structural imbalance because we have the current concept to the in floater ackley with the inflow so that this creates that surplus. to close i would say there is this point by steve we shouldn't talk about risks and challenges. are we optimists? we like to say we are cautiously optimistic that china will again find the way through the challenges going forward. we are optimistic because china has found that a way to overcome seemingly insurmountable challenges and that makes it reasonable to give them the

benefit of the doubt and think that we would again transition to this new area of growth. we are cautiously optimistic. cautious i would say because there is a lot of uncertainty out there. how the global economy will ebal and the china policy is well ebal. frankly a lot about what is happening. there is still a number of capacity about the development in china that make it simply impossible to be sure that these problems and challenges will be mastered. so in the end, both of the authorities and the outsiders who would need to watch carefully would be china watchers and at some point, you know, providing them as well. >> for the organization and to steve and david for sharing with us and for being such an

attentive audience. >> [inaudible conversations] richard baker headed the u.s. historical office from its founding in 1975

coming ahead of any votes in congress on whether to authorize military force. majority leader harry reid filed the syria resolution today during a brief senate session allowing the full chamber to proceed to the resolution on monday when members return from the august recess. here's a look. >> mr. president, i am grateful for everyone's cooperation getting us to this point. i now ask unanimous consent that the indication relating to section 2 be printed in the record. >> without objection the letter will be printed.

>> mr. president we convene the senate today for the senate foreign relations committee for the joint resolution which authorizes the use of military force against syria and response to the syrian regime and the chemical weapons. as we know many people have been killed with this including almost 500 children. it was signed by committee leaders. senators menendez and corker. the tremendous model of bipartisanship and collaboration between the senate. i add my ear both of these good men for the work that the of them in the leadership that the schoem and allowing us to be at the point that we are now in this difficult situation. >> to authorize a reaction against syria. votes on the senate could come

out as early as wednesday. you can watch coverage here on c-span2 when members return on monday at 2:00 eastern. over the summer the supreme court struck down a provision of the 1965 voting rights act effectively eliminating the requirement that certain states of the history of discrimination and voting reseat preclearance from the justice department before changing election laws. the southern christian leadership conference recently hosted a discussion with civil rights leaders about what measures can be taken to ensure that everyone has the right to vote. this is just over two hours. >> the voting has been called the right that fundamentalists support all other rights. and a democracy the right to vote this fundamental. yet there was a question about whether or not the right to vote is fully protected in the united

states constitution. one of the elements that has changed this 50th anniversary celebration from a celebration to a real demonstration and demand for freedom is shall be holder the decision by the united states supreme court that calls this a question and actually determines that section 4 of the voting rights act is no longer constitutional. that didn't come as a shock to people that watch the court. it had been an effort sometime now. because apparently, unfortunately our country is moving away from a majority of a deal where we are expanding the right to vote to a time in our history where we are contacting making smaller the right to go to. and it is especially dangerous

in the country where there is no national religion. there is no national language. we speak minimum languages. we are many colors. there is no national race. but we have this ephemeral set of ideals that we believe. one-person, one-vote. equal protection under the law. due process. that is our national secular scripture. that's what we say we believe and that is what makes us america. but it is what we are here this evening to discuss. we are with the right to vote. some of the issues we hope to cover or the impact of shall be holder the infinite new mayor north carolina vote they didn't wait for the eink to be drawing on the supreme court opinion before texas and north carolina

and other jurisdictions started to flex the mosul. let me back up just a little bit to the tune of that section five requires that all voting changes covers the jurisdiction to be submitted to the department of justice for the preclearance or to be cleared by the federal court. you know that shell bv holder said no more section 5 preclearance. and let's not be naive. section five is a heavy hammer. it is unusual in the law to have something that is punished before it happens. if you have a client i don't care what kind of record they've got. they can have ten armed robberies. their proclivity does not subject and to the prosecution. but to cover those jurisdictions

that are covered by the voting rights act section 5 have been sold through the region so systematic in their persistence in suppressing the votes that the congress enacted section 5 of the voting rights act because we can't stop you will no other way. we have to -- you have to send your lobby for and because you can't be trusted to run elections on your own to that i'm going to get out of your way. but jimmy carter said something that was instructive to me and perhaps it will aid you in your understanding of what can be a conflict issue and he said i can't monitor the u.s. elections. we know that as a past president jimmy carter has gone all over the world monitoring the elections to make sure that they are fair and the people's will to express. he said i can't monitor the u.s. elections because there is no

election authority and there is no uniform set of process tease and procedures. that to some extent is what we hope to discuss today and we have a luxurious panel. to make sure that we get into a conversation and not just a lecture, i want to ask john conyers, you first having served so many years representing michigan founder of the congressional black caucus so many accomplishments. violence against women act, a real legislative tighten and the congress. what is it in the congress that they can and should do to address the system of the voter suppression that we are experiencing today? >> dr. mathis, thank you. and i am so honored to be here with this distinguished panel.

many of my colleagues are here as well. to see so many people here representing the greek organizations that have brought us together to celebrate this 50th anniversary first let me say and get it out of the way we have made progress, but there are people now determined as much as they were 50 years ago to see the return to the clock and that's what they are working on and in some places they are doing quite well. by the way, there are some seats that need to be watched more carefully than others. i'm on a committee that is trying to draft a way around or

over or under shelby county verses holder and we are going to get there. [applause] one thing i wanted to point out to you very briefly is that we have now begun to look at a way to do this without trying to fix up the shelby county decision. sometimes people create their own backlash and give us opportunities that we would have never had their being disenfranchised from the vote now than ever before because of shall be verses holder and we are going to make sure that nobody forgets it and we are noticing that a lot of people are now coming forward this

includes me. i'm going to be cut out of this section five in junction ahead of time to stop all of the state's that need to be preclearance before they can change any voting rights laws. how many are there? nine seats. but my brothers and sisters, but me tell you we have got some skilled people. some of them are on the committee that is helping me the right the law. but we have federal of servers. they haven't taken those away from us. we have federal election monitors who are still in the department of justice and so

what we are saying in the civil rights division of the department of justice what we want to make sure is that we do not diminish the domestic department of justice budget because we are going to need more resources. we are going to need more lawyers in the civil rights division protecting voter rights than ever before because we are more alert now than ever before for what these folks are willing to do on the two states they're sending out like a sore thumb. one is north carolina and the other is nevada. there are others that are doing it. but to cut out and reduce the registration, early registration

of the early voting. lots of little things that show you one thing. why and how can we reduce the number of people. that's what they are about. and thank goodness some of them are making no bones about it. so we have an opportunity to point out that this isn't going to just affect us. it's going to affect a lot more people. and one of those groups are hispanic groups, mexican-americans, puerto rico and other latin people who are being affected the same line. after all once you start looking at who is coming you are trying

to cut out and you sometimes get the wrong people these days. we don't look like we are supposed to look. so it is in that sense that i join you hear with these organizations that have brought us together to celebrate and to remember 50 years ago. but to remember the great job that lays ahead. >> thank you, congressman john conyers. [applause] you mentioned something important and i would ask congresswoman sheila jackson lee to respond to this. this is not just about race and african-americans. you represent houston what is the lead of the land from your

perspective in congress and our people feeling about eric holder in the state of texas? >> some believe they have a birthday party yesterday and others were not invited to the party to the thank you and express my appreciation for the broad audience, the reflections of those who were here in 1963. this is the kind of audience that works together hand in hand. people that came together from all religious backgrounds. if you look in this room we are white and black and i know that we are latino. we are women and men and asian. the religions are different and that is what america is all about. the idea of the voting rights act being undermined, diminished and eliminated in a sense is a statement to the world that those of us that her different and bring different ideas to the people are not in fact the same under one flag and under one

america. i want you to take the heart that you are. walk with your back straight. for you were walking to tell the world that we too or america. i am honored to be with a man who shares my committee. the terminology is ranking under the minority contract john conyers. [applause] part of the construct of the legislative act of 1965 we must honor those that have put -- [applause]

and i will get the doctors question answered very quickly. but i wanted us to honor him. i'm delighted to be with the converse woman in florida that is an exciting place to be. we work together and brother hank johnson, we found our way on the judiciary committee and i want to also have his knowledge again. they speak about those that were there in 1963. i want to say that i am glad not only was he a round, but he's around today we must honor reverend jesse jackson to the [applause]

let me just read dr. king in 1967 before his death this with brought to my attention by jeff johnson. when people are admired and oppression they realize deliverance only when they have accumulated the power to enforce change. the power to never lose opportunities. they remain available to them. they are powerless on the other hand. they never experience opportunity to the it's always at a later time. the past two days to discover how to organize the strength to the compelling power so that the government cannot delude our demand to be of the voting rights act was a response to organized power, not violently. so listen to your needs and be able to lift you up in the vote. to answer the question regarding texas, we have now been joined by brothers and sisters, latino

brothers and sisters. as you well know, we are in the struggle if you will, we are in the struggle right now to assist them with comprehensive immigration reform. the problem that we face is that it seemed as if after the voting rights act, which by the way created the only opportunity for the honorable barbara jordan to be elected to the united states congress to be elected to congress in the south as reconstruction. that was around 1972. so for those who think we don't need something called the voting rights act misconstrue the schiraldi case because the courts point in the case as john conyers indicated it's okay. we have high numbers of turnout coming and we did. we have an african-american president. you voted like you've never voted before.

and the registration content, that is backward. it is not the intent was. the intent was the barrier to voting on the things like the poll tax and the intimidation and the jellybean. it was not the turnout. and so, what we have now is a shelby case that a erroneously decided its decision. the defense by ginsburg was marvelous. if i can use any other word. the work that we did in 2006i had the honor and the privilege and then mr. conyers was a ranking member next to mr. sensenbrenner and that was a partnership made in heaven so i say this to my republican brothers and sisters, my brothers and sisters who are not in this room that we can do this again. the plant is it wasn't a

question of whether or not i registered or i voted on what occasion. it was the continued application to the preclearance remedy. why not do it in the positive who raises a hand and believes that there is an indication going on in america today that the preclearance still exists. how many people believe that? how many people believe that there are barriers to voting? so the supreme court was wrong. what has happened in texas is on the minutes after the supreme court decision was rendered that tuesday, am i correct? the day before because i was in court, i was in court with a section five case in texas they were closing down the last standing independent striving

and successful african-american school district which a merging latino population of 64 whose numbers were going up, solvent, but now you have a reputation and they were going on that. they were thrown out of court on tuesday and as well the week of the texas voter might need. but more important latino by the thousands was the reason why the voter i.d. wasn't cleared in the first place. and so now this boater ideal all that is in place has been determined rightly so by the united states department of justice to intervene only on the variety but because it was a contract to go to the office and in 82 of the county's thousands of latinos would be deprived as long as those that were

african-americans and they've also taken over the case and in the district for every moment that i've been in the united states congress. let me finish on this. if you want to realize the crisis that we are and i know that some of us will talk about the north carolina but i know that the north carolinian is here. but here is the headline in the chronicle paper. this is the houston paper as i left thursday to come here. voting plans hold power. one of our local cities wants to turn the clock back on the symbol limit districts and buy right now the city council has voted affirmatively to take away the two symbol districts and to give them at large seats and in the article it says i don't have to worry about anybody telling me that i can't do it. my brothers and sisters, if you don't think that the questions that poverty, education, criminal justice system even to

throw eggs and tomatoes at some elected officials that you know, let me have you understand dr. king's words that when you organize your power and you have to have someone implement and do something with it. if you take away the voting strength and if you cut it down then what you have is the solution of that power. we have a crisis in texas and a crisis in north carolina and georgia. but you know what they said is they come for me at night they are going to come for you in the morning. [applause] we have to get the voting rights act back in place because it is a vehicle that dr. king gave birth to a few well to allow us to be where we are today. this is happening in texas. thank you very much. [applause] >> yale undergraduate from the

university law school. she comes fully prepared for this today. i want to shift gears just a little bit. we talked about the right to vote. but what about the folks that are pushing some of these changes? we aren't doing this because we don't want black folks to vote. we aren't doing this because we have racial animus in our heart. we are doing this because we are trying to make sure there is no voter fraud in a war election process. hank johnson we were among the first in the voter i.d.. some of us did, didn't we? we just -- couldn't nobody quite hear us back then. but we knew this wasn't about voter fraud because there was virtually no voter fraud in the united states and not in georgia.

what is moving this agenda so hard and so fast in your opinion with congress representing the fourth congressional district in georgia, a lawyer jesse jackson delegate in 1988 if i'm not mistaken and a key observer on the judiciary committee what is it going to take to get bipartisan support on some of the solutions are available? >> my response to the question is it is economics that motivate i will explain in just a second. i would be remiss to be on the stage and sit next to the reverend jesse jackson without sharing with you all something i will never forget. it happens back in the a etds. sometime in the early 80's.

it was in the baptist church north. it was a rainbow/push rainbow p. small meeting. joe beasley was there. cameron alexander, the pastor was present and a number of others but was a small group. reverend jackson, you came to speak with us about what you saw overseas. you had been somewhere. i don't recall where it was that it was asia i believe, or maybe it was -- mabey -- i'm sure that it was in asia. it seems like it must have been maybe china or perhaps somewhere around there. and you had visited these

sweatshops where women were hard at work working 16, 20 hours. indonesia is where he had been a. when he told us the story of these women working in the factories producing goods that we in america enjoyed, he cried for those women as he told us about their plight. and i always thought that that was a really important moment because, he cared so much and was international. these were not black women. it was an international

situation that he was pointing out to us. this is back in the east. now 30 years down the line, reverend jackson is still with us, still leading the way talking about the same issues. i am honored to sit here beside him today. you know, the march on washington back in '63 and was largely about the discrimination that african-americans experienced. the stated demands of the march were first the passage of meaningful civil rights legislation, but the elimination of racial segregation in public

schools, protection for demonstrators against police brutality, and major public works program to promote jobs. the passage prohibiting racial discrimination in public and private hiring. eight raise in the then i believe it was a dollar 25 or another 45 minimum wage. it's $7.25 now. last but not least, self-government for the district of columbia which had a black majority. now as a result of that march and other events, the civil rights act of 1964 indeed past. it passed by legislators who were voted on by the people.

so, the people exercised their right to vote the persons in office there were serving them did the right thing. they enacted policies that should have created abundant opportunities, economic opportunities as well as civil rights and liberties for every one. what do we have looking back now at the civil rights legislation? we have situations where voting rights, civil rights, most fundamental civil right is under attack by an out of control judicial activist supreme court. we have public education being dismantled. they used to talk about school

vouchers, but now it is called the charter school movement and a lot of us have fallen for that. we have all like standing around. show me your policies like new york city stock that have transcended the of original issue of police brutality. talking about a public works program to create jobs. we have been talking about that for a long time now. we need it that. put people back to work. affirmative action to address the centuries of the disadvantageous miss that have been heaped upon african-americans, affirmative action has been gutted just like the voting rights act.

workers $7.25. still not a living wage. we are fighting for an increase in the minimum wage. and not to mention of the offshore jobs and the dismantling and breaking of the unit. we are still in washington, d.c. in a situation where there is taxation without representation. [applause] so what has happened with that right to vote we either have not voted or we voted against or own economic interest. basically people from middle

america voting against their own economic interest because we have been put on against it to other because we are responsible for anybody else's and ability to make a living when in fact the wealth has been redistributed to the top 2%. and so to the extent they can keep black folks from voting they are also hurting students, white students, latino students, and they are hurting the of devotee of everyone of all working people to exercise the right to vote. so this gives an opportunity to create alliances and to really stretch out and moved from a more equal society so that's my eighth response. i'm glad that this is happening.

[applause] >> to the extent that we, the crowd 47% -- >> we want affordable housing and health care and education for our children we work hard every day. they will not be part of the american dream. we have a shrinking middle class more than we have had since the great depression. and some folks want to keep it that way. you are a keen observer to read the naacp runs the washington, d.c. bureau where i want to know what is going on in congress and can't get to washington, i can

read her e-mails and feel like i'm right there. she's laughing because i'm telling the truth. if given more the congress is now how likely is it to get bipartisan support to hold back some of the measures and is it feasible that the legislation which has some 170 some sponsors now and can you explain what that is? >> i want to thank janice for putting this all together. [applause] and the rainbow coalition for doing its work to make sure we get these issues right. [applause]

we also have to recognize who are the storm troopers for the civil rights are. i am so deeply honored to sit among the people in the congressional black caucus that provide the leadership on capitol hill all day and every day. [applause] and the dean of the congressional black caucus what they do for us all day and every day. [applause] and i would also be premised in having this conversation very closely and very deeply and my heart recognizing the great jesse louis jackson. [applause] - with reverend jackson and with had to watch them carry reverend jackson from all of those villages and cities across the country because he would work

until he would literally fall over and we would have to carry him back to the hotel in the wee hours of the night to beat thank you. [applause] >> as we talk about what is on capitol hill i almost feel a little bit like jonah, the weekend fishermen because we have the storm troopers with meter having to fight for this all day and every day on capitol hill. i used to help provide some coordination to about the country and i think that one of the things he would do as you leave the room is there is a table in the back just outside of the door to bid on that table our action alerts, talking points, sample letters and the form to fill out. this is going to be a great discussion but this is only going to be the point in which we pause for a moment in this fight to organize and reorganize and be prepared to have the fight we are going to have to have and the congress goes back

into session. please fill out those forms so you get those alerts that janice was talking about on capitol hill. we can win these fights if we are organized. the legislation that we are talking about are bills that we have gotten through under the worst of circumstances. we have gotten more done quite frankly and even having folks that or not our brand allegiance in the house and the senate with a friend in the white house putting it and i am convinced with a friend of leading the u.s. senate and a friend in the white house and these brothers and sisters in the house of representative we can win this fight. [applause] >> when you talk about a piece of legislation there are really two bills. one has been introduced that we have to discuss. one that actually modernizes our election system. what we were doing prior to the attack that we received from the u.s. supreme court on the voting rights act laid out on the

august 28th day of 1963 you see here in washington when dr. king gave the i have a dream speech and roy wilkins of the building so many others that were standing there along with john lewis stopped for a moment and recognize even though it was the 100th anniversary of the emancipation proclamation, august 23rd was the 100th anniversary of the emancipation proclamation. 50 years later this is the 50th anniversary. those important marks on the watershed in the movement forward. we have an awful lot done. people thought that when we came there that we would never be able to fix the problems we have now even though the constitution had guaranteed us. when we looked all was going on and we recognized that through that process -- we went through the reconstruction era in which the constitution would clarify to provide those rights and

protections through the three reconstruction amendments. the first one was of course guaranteeing equal protection under the law. the second one was the fourth amendment saying indeed, we with former servitude would be considered full class citizens in the country and so with our children and our children's children they made it very clear. and third clarified our right to vote. eight said that even though a former servitude would not allow any state or jurisdiction to pass any measure that would in any way interfere with the right to vote. but brothers and sisters, you know what we have been through since then good men got killed after those amendments to the constitution were passed today we look at the challenges we had before the churches got burned to the even after those amendments to the constitution were passed to the it was very clear to us when the march that ended 63 that we were going to have to actually have a legal

contract that would actually move to enforce the rights guaranteed by the constitution because clearly the constitution itself wasn't enough. if we move to the process we know there are bills we need to pass to further strengthen that opportunity. and as janice asked that question one of the things we recognize is that the trucks are being played all the time. as the saying goes even the land and related doesn't mean that they are not out to get me. [applause] and i paranoid. i have them up on capitol hill for a long time. that being said, there are a number of things that are very helpful. number one, it was a cure that made sure the tool are in place so that people can get registered and vote. some basic issues. as a matter of fact, the call for the study that i move towards an automatic

registration. i've had this conversation with the congressman on several locations. the question is as he put it, how is it that the time our children turn each team they are automatically registered to drive even though we don't draft anymore? so congressman conyers said if you can register the folks to go out and get shot to death for the for the cause might be can we on not mention the automatically registered to vote at time? [applause] >> thank you, congressman. we love you to death. it's amazing how so often the best policy is a good common sense. something the present companies don't have enough of on capitol hill. as my friend sheila jackson lee

says whenever she comes to the naacp convention -- and she comes every year -- she says hilary, a nervous about being here because with you and us being here, there really is no adult supervision on capitol hill. [laughter] congresswoman, you are right about that. so, the bill moves to modernize the ways that make sense. look, be passed something called the help america boat act. in the election of 2000. what we've recognized is even though the basic rights and basic framework was in place, there were too many holes in the system. there were too many opportunities for all kind of problems. one of the things that we put in is to make sure to address some of the shenanigans. some of the trickery that we see happening. if we look at the issues like photo id, the question was asked in kansas state when it passed the photo id bill and in

pennsylvania when it passed and it moved into the law its photo id bill to get the question that we are asking in both places is how much discrimination, how much fraud have you had with people going to the polls pretending to be something that they are not? my good friend sam brownback, former u.s. senator from the state of kansas, the present governor of the state of kansas signed a bill into law that said we are going to restore the integrity back to the election process by rooting out fraud to get so we asked the basic question. how much fraud has there been? as the answer came forward, the answer was there have been zero cases of people pretending to be something they are not in the last ten years in the state of kansas before they signed the bill. let's shift from the plains states to the east coast.

pennsylvania prior to the last election. the governor stands up and says we are going to move this bill forward because if we pass this bill, we believe mitt romney can get elected in the state of pennsylvania. that is what he said. we challenged him in court in the interrogatory set forth and the question of the state attorney that was represented in the case. in the last ten years how many cases of the voter fraud of people pretending to be something they are not came up? the answer was zero. next question. are you inspecting cases of the voter fraud moving forward into the system as we go towards this election expecting a bunch of cases because when we look at the data what we saw is if you pass this bill come 830,000 are not going to be be able to vote because they don't have the

voter i.d. to do that. coincidentally enough, jesse jackson, excuse me it should have been jesse. barack obama one button election in 2008 by 640,000 votes. paranoia? mabey. but the bottom-line -- i think i have it. the bill number is the american voting rights act. the act in 2013. >> we will be moving one in the senate as well. the point i want to make that isn't the only bill the we are going to be looking out for. we know that john conyers is

sitting down with jim sensenbrenner and everyone sitting down with them as well on both sides of the aisle to craft this piece to make sure that we can fix the section. we are delighted to see and we have to make sure that everyone in this room gets it. the only way that we can pass the fix to section for allowing the utilization of the preclearance section of the voting rights act section 5 is if it is bipartisan. so the catch phrase is that it must be bipartisan and that is where we are that jim sensenbrenner is leading the phrase to make sure that we can address these concerns as well. please grab a beeper, and let's be prepared. [applause] >> hilary shelton, naacp. >> you raise an interesting point, hilary, about meeting bipartisan support and we talked about that a little bit.

but one of the things that we have to be concerned with now as we move forward is getting that legislation passed. the voting rights act was reauthorize in 2006 with an overwhelming majority of legislative boating pivoted the supreme court that it back down. john conyers, this question is for you. do you wake up in the middle of the night thinking about whether the supreme court is ready to nullify the act of congress? they always have been. so i don't wink up at night thinking about that. laughter irca what do we know if you examine the decisions of the united states supreme court they've led us down on the citizens united to begin with

where the unlimited money can now be delivered secretly into the political process. so that's why what we are all saying here is that everybody has got to turn out to counteract the huge amounts of secret financing going into the campaigns as a result of the united states supreme court. >> this question is for the congresswoman corrine brown. there is an occupational sort of a non-in florida and some folks have decided if they don't take over the state house they lose a portion of it and florida. [applause] and i know that you come from an activist background yourself. would you please address the role of activism and making our necessity felt?

>> god is good. let me try again. all the time god is good. i agree when you are born you get a birth certificate and when you die a few are going to get a death certificate and what is in between is what is going to make this a better place. i would rather think jesse louis jackson and all the people here for what they have done. let's give them a hand. [applause] chris deval let me ask the question any veterans in the room, raise your hand. let's give them a hand. [applause]

for the comprise and that's how hastings carried me and myself got elected. let's be clear, we would not have gotten elected if it were

for the hard work of people like reverend jackson. and even in this last election, we went to hamlet to hamlet, night after night to make sure people understood not just go out and vote for the president and vote for the congressperson, but you have to vote up-and-down that ballot. and the attorney generals and the judges are crucial! [cheering and applause] i represent sanford, florida, a young black person can be murdered and not guilty. and right over in jacksonville, a black woman request shoot a -- [inaudible] and get twenty years. [applause] there's something wrong with the system! but we can work to change it. let me just mention one other two. tuesday night, tuesday night the city council, 19 at large, voted

to -- the supervisor of election office. that's the predominantly african-american area that anybody can vote in the precinct. they fooled this to an area, no transportation. no buses, and gateway it was a -- -- they have never done that in the history of jacksonville. why do you think they moved it? not the lord -- location, transportation, the area they move the supervisor's office, it is nothing. and as i said, in the 2000 election they stole 27,000 voters. precinct 7, 8, 9, 10. the facility is gateway. we can watch them count and monitor the elections, but they moved it where it's no transportation.

nothing out there. a warehouse in the middle of nowhere. you need to know, if left up to us, we -- the work is for all of us. we have to work together. we have to be involved. you can't think that reverend jackson can do it by himself! you can't think the president can do it by himself! [applause] it takes all of us! [applause] we have to work together to turn it around! [cheering and applause] [inaudible] and for each one of us to do. it's not just the leadership here, everybody! we are all marching tomorrow. but when you go home, that's where the march begins. [cheering and applause] thank you! >> thank you, congresswoman

corrine brown from jacksonville, florida. she mentioned there's something for us all to do. one of the big differences between section 5 preclearance action and section two and three litigation is proving intent to discriminate based on race. and then something that we can all help with. that is a gathering of stories or incidents being in touch with our elected officials so we know what their intentions are. you can't -- knowing somebody's intentions you have to know somebody personally know their intentions. especially this. people don't tell you exactly what their intentions are.

we had to be vigilant observers in our own communities. with our own elected officials. and record that information. i had a -- i woke with a -- [inaudible] i said just because section five is under attack and we can't use preclearance the way we used to, we can still submit to something. nobody can stop us from writing a letter to the justice department, can they? we want to get to your comments

and questions before we close the session. i know, the horror stories we talked about. how horrible it is. corrine, you said it's something we can do. let's do a lightening round of a minute or piece and talk about one or two things we can go back home and do. i want to start with you, congressman conyers. >> thank you. the best thing we can do is educate each other as far as what the threat is, and if we have that knowledge, and if we have good leadership, we have a great leader here, reverend jesse jackson. we have a number of other leaders in your community. people of good will mean good for everyone who are looking forward to prosperity for us all.

those are the folks that we should be following. if they're not involved in politics because i don't think you can -- i think you might be shooting up the own tree. politics is extremely important. it opens up the economics. if we do not participate in politics, if we do not rally ourselves to overcome whatever obstacle is put before us in a hostile at fear -- atmosphere where we can't depend on the courts. we must overcome. we have to do that through strength and unity. we educate ourselves being unit -- unified in term of what we need to do. that would be my one minute spiel. >> may i go next? >> certainly! >> because i'm sitting up here thinking and i'm thinking about georgia's the red state and

that's where my mother is from. it's no reason why georgia should be a red state. [applause] african-americans -- [inaudible] [laughter] i have said, yes, in florida we not only do you have to register, but you got to make sure you're registered. and we have to make sure they count the votes! with that there are many things we can do. it's not just one thing. we have a 70% direct filing of youth. what is that, corrine? new flavoring. when you direct -- [inaudible] so they ask never get a decent job. so that is -- that's something you have to do in that area. foreclosures, what is that?

the major source of wealth. like bandits and people are losing their homes. because -- it's a lot of work -- each one of us to do and we cannot do it by ourselves. >> all right. >> the strength of the -- and we have to be together. all right! >> thank you, congresswoman. are there in any other instructions what we can go back to our home and do? >> thank you, jackson lee. >> i know the president is in the room. let me thank him for his leadership. i'm sort of looking around. [applause] [applause] [applause] so, you know, i have my credential. i worked with the southern

leadership conference. do i have credential? >> you do indeed! and worked with brother james orange and others and williams and registration and places along -- [inaudible conversations] so i was just listening in my mother's eyes a time i was doing. but there's a song that the beatles sung, they said "let it be, let it be." it's a soothing song. i must state the difference and say you must go home and not threat be. that's what we have doing until we are busy. we have to be busy on the right things. and so i would suggest to you that you've got getting agitated. i don't want you to get ugly. i want do you getting agitated and find alliances that are way beyond. we have union alliances. we have women alliances now! we have the latino community, the asian community, we can walk two and two together or three

and three together. i want to take two points, you know, always going back to the supreme court decision, and i'm glad that hillary hillary mentioned the 13*9, 14th amendment. justice ginsburg said there's nothing with in the congress if for the voting rights act was inconsistent with the 13, 14, 15th amendment. what she was saying was it baffled her that the supreme court even went there. there was nothing unconstitutional about section five. it was doing its job. that was to ensure there was no discriminate story practices to keep anybody from voting. and so we have to rethink, and understand so we know from what we're talking about. let me give you this so i'll finish on what you need to do. it's a north carolina -- do i have any north carolina begans in here? >> a few of them. let's salute reverend basher. thank you, retched. let me say this so you can say

agitated and inspired. let me say this. shutting down, closing down early voting, cutting down the days, all right. they had no same-day voting. telling you there can be no straight-party voter. why can you tell a voter the way they can't vote the way they want to vote? telling you by state law no same-party voting. mail in absentee ballots must be in a form. no teenage preregistration. poll hours will be shut down. let me give you real quick. -- two parties can san diego bunch of people in there for fear and intimidation. and then, of course, the id -- no student id. u.s. -- let's see what is not allowed here. very quickly. it must be one of these. no student id is allowed.

and the id must -- well, we ought expired. way to put barriers. here is my point go home. find your education issue, your economic issue, your criminal justice issue, because just as north carolina has its set of laws that are barrier. texas has its set of laws. there may be something in your community. you may up north or down south. there may be school closings. it's a shame we standby and let our schools be closed. that's a destruction of our neighborhood and community. if you can do anything, you can get in the way of school closings. so i would suggest that you find the issue of your day. and you are in essence saying what the constitution at hand that i'm an american that has the ability of protest and petition. peaceably without violence. i'm not -- ready to let it be. we cannot go back from this day

and let it be! it's a march, but it is a march in commemoration, but as i heard a young person say it's a march of continuity. you must continue the fight and find the fight in your neighborhood. if you give us a call up, if you give us a hookup, we'll come to help you in your neighborhood. thank you all! >> thank you, congresswoman sheila jackson lee. >> hillary, do you want to add a comment? >> five quick points. one, now there's not a mandate for those states and jurisdictions that have to report changes before they make them, they're making them now anyway. as you know, texas cut a redistricting map that was so unconstitutional it was shut down by the justice department. the day that the supreme court decision came down, they announced in texas we can now move ahead with this redistricting plan that will

disenfranchise african-americans and others throughout the state of texas. we know they are moving in that direction. we want to make sure we are monitoring them now. erick holder said don -- down with the naacp and others we set up a process that more lawyers and resources -- i say -- [inaudible] [applause] in to the voting rights section even as they cutting overall budget. there's a lot to be said for those priorities. they're doing that to be helpful. they are cutting the budget because they don't want them to be healthy. let me say one thing before the last thing. these people sitting up here got involved on a fight on capitol hill when holder said we have to stop disfranchise and photoid law. our nonfriends on capitol hill moved a writer to the budget said you cannot use any money in your tbowjt go after the

discriminate measures. when holder said i'm going to have states to use racial profiling to enforce anti-immigration laws, they said from putting a writer on your budget saying you can't go to any states and enforce it. -- and force this kind of program. enforcing racial profiling. and then they went after step of the way. then they trumped up charges on the so-called fast and furious. that was all about trying to stop in order from doing what he needed to do. he's moving the issues anyway. we have to make sure we provide them with the information we have to monitor any changes the plans. and any changes that voter registration and other forms of activities going on. number two, we have to monitor what happens at the polls on election day. there are a number of off-term elections coming up for mayors, governors and a few other things. we want to make sure you are watching closely and reporting back to us as fast as you can. we need the information as we craft a solution to section 4.

number three, i want to make sure you visit your members of congress while they're back home. one of the biggest problems is the only ones you want to talk about are the ones that help us anyway. we need to talk to ones the ones you don't want to talk to anyway. those that we know are up to no good. and try to move measures to try to make sure the constant state of affairs is very much in place. we have been winning in this process, that's why they are changing the rules. number four, i want to make sure you're signed up to get the information straight from us. there's a form in the back once you sign up, as soon as these bills are moving, as soon as they are going to the committee process, we sent out an alert to tell you what is going on. we give you talking points, sample letter, and ask that you go in and visit with the member of congress which is the last point. we want to make sure we go back we leave here, when we leave we do what dr. king told us to do the first time. you talk about it the front end. the importance of us being

ability to take on the struggle. the front thanked the reason we came to washington is because the constitution was like a promissory note. it's one that promised us we have the right of citizenship that everyone else has; however, once we tried to cash the check it came back stamped insufficient funds! we have to make sure as we go back we are able to register more voters than ever before no matter what kind of stuff they pull on us. we will win in the 2014 election! [applause] >> i want know what we want to do -- any other responses about what we can constructively do when we return home. i want to -- >> i want to do a p. s. we want to make sure we register young people who are sometimes we think turnouts is all that we

need. we can build on what hillary said. let's go and find those young people not only to let them be leaders of the registration efforts as i've heard over this wonderful day of messages that have come out. but find these young leaders and groups they lead and push them out to be able to go across your area. across your state and register all those recent grads. all of those standing where they think they cannot survive. go get them! register them! let them understand what empowerment is about! >> congresswoman jackson lee, you know, i have come to a conclusion that as a little bit radical. one of the things that hurt me most about next was doing away with the early registration. the preregistration of teenagers. so the young people, while they're still at home, before they get jobs before they go college, while they're taking u.s. history cannot preregister to vote.

i was among that first group to vote at 18 as opposed to 21. i think, hank, you were in that too. as a result of the vietnam war. they lowered the voting age because it was indisappoint have us fight the war and couldn't vote. i would submit to you to given twitter, facebook, and smartphones and laptops and maybe the 16-year-olds, if you can be shot down in the street, drop out of school, get a job, get married, have consensual sexual relationship. maybe you are mature enough to think about voting. what happens if we lower the voting age? >> i think it would be good. >> it would help. it wop would help. because you get people issue canned about criminal justice, and concerned about -- nobody stop me in the street. i have gotten too old for the profile. the young people -- reverend jackson, i want you to

come and sum it up for us. you have been so patient, and always so -- somebody think you listen. i didn't know you listen, but do you listen! you have been listening to the america public for a long time. you know it better than i can think of. when people are really in trouble, you know, they sometimes they forget they know our phone number, but you can tell when somebody, somebody, somebody really in trouble and they have facing a bank or judge or don't know what to do about. they find that phone number. they find in the middle of the night, and they call until they get us. or get you to go get them. he's not far from reach. how a heroic person there when we need him. reverend jackson, please sum this up! i'm going take some questions and comments from the audience, okay? [applause] >> i have several concerns to list. one, over here this weekend as

we listen to congress people speak and organization leaders speak and three presidents speak, we hear the reflection and motivation we hear from legislation and the appropriations. just to reflect -- [inaudible] it must be a legislation and appropriation. encouraging me for the -- we have more power today than fifty years ago. will we use it? we have the sense of urgency in '63 is the right to -- take the right to vote the highest priority. it seems to me which racial

allies. first of all, this is not a black issue. we do know blacks have the right vote and couldn't vote in the south in 1965. white women could serve on jurors until 1967. it for the most part, there was no woman on the supreme court. 18-year-olds couldn't vote until 1970 during the war. you couldn't walk on the campus since 1974. you couldn't get biealing yule [inaudible] campaign so if you have a shift, and plank come out the bottom, one of those sink the whole ship. blacks go down, latinos have less immigration allies. if this ship goes down, women have less -- the woman who held up the

legislature in texas won with the combination of black, brown, white votes. progressive white women, blacks, latinos, i issue the balance of that. we should not get locked in to save us. we cannot save us by virtue of the proposition. the second issue is that i want to really question this is this about the need to have the constitutional right to or the state's right to vote? it seems to me as oppose to the state right -- he left the car in the driveway and took away the key. without the key, the car can't move. what is going to happen? watch --

real fast. and they have file suits to keep the state, it's going to be expensive fights. you may lose to in arizona right now. you take districts like -- [inaudible] 25% that's gone. it's like columbia to johnson. it's a long wait. it seems to me what we're looking at come january -- the republican legislature are going come back for redistricting schemes. they have to fight. we have to go to judges that may not be our allies allies in those suits, and -- we gate fight to get it redone again. that it is like what happened

-- north carolina can take precinct off college campuses. and for 9,000 people in one precinct. given what already have the -- [inaudible] we have the power now for a moment. we have the power. and the sense of urgency and the multiracial and multiculture and american as he can be convene the congress. maybe three people can. one person in particular. make a case to the congress on -- has been done immigration and other issues that matter on the protective right to vote for all americans. and not allow states rights to take over again. we came out of the states rights fight fifty years ago! if there ever were a time. if there ever were a time, it is

now to make a change for constitutionally protected right to vote. the 15th amendment implies we should protect from discrimination, but you have the constitutional right to bear a gun. the constitutional right to free speech because your state explicitly. you have the same right to vote. president obama has been teaching constitutional law he opened up the class by saying that it may come as a shock to you, we you don't have the -- constitutional lawyer. the question becomes for those who represent us, fight for the right -- you might fight and win. you might fight for less than what we need and win. and there is no glory in -- i would like to think real soon and people come back the most major press conference you can amass and broad as the base can

be make no -- higher than this. because all of the things from a right to vote. all the judges are from this. contracts from this. public works fall from this. immigration policy falls from this. racial justice falls from this. public education flows from this. public transportation -- we saw in florida, corrine, as you know, and wisconsin, where they in fact cut off public transportation and the money on the basis of marginalization. and i would hope we would be clear on the fact that the demonstration had a political agenda. it was not just moral. it was moral but it was linked up to political.

we marched far. we marched for the right to vote. we marched for open housing. [inaudible] back to washington this last time already was a -- [inaudible] resurrection city. we'll be standing on saturday demanding that we lift the for people. again, i say johnson in the folks campaign in appalachia. he widened the face of poverty and deracialize the base. there are more poor white people than brown or black people. those folks work every day but without health insurance. when they cut public transportation you can't goat work. i would hope as we discuss this today and so forth, the decision of the institutional right to vote must be on the agenda. i submit that for appeal.

[applause] the constitutional right to vote, which we don't have. we have the state's right. every state has its own agenda. we have fifty elections. within the starts you it's just like -- [inaudible] there's no way to -- there is no -- you can judge a basketball came whether you're in california or new york. we can centralize the authority for protection of vote. we cannot protect the vote in texas from chicago. we cannot protect the right from north carolina to virginia. [inaudible] >> you're the man.

>> well, we need to constitutionalize the right to vote. you've said that and i think everyone here agrees. the question that we have to really put together is the legal that overcomes the reluctance that has prevented us from doing this. we've got dozens of supreme court decisions that suggest we have a -- constitution that right that imply there is a right somewhere in there, and i i am very proud to take it up with my two excellent colleagues on the judiciary that we with some lawyers organizations, legal aid and defenders we have a whole

course of attorneys and howard university. this is a subject matter that we've got move expeditiously on, but with great caution. >> john, the reason i raise the sense of urgency, you see what north carolina is doing. texas in june or july; right? we wait past this session, and those are red states come states come out -- in january it would take years to 2013 to 2063.

the congressional black caucus annual convention starts on september the 21st. the third week of september, and i would like you to address our civil rights panel. it has got to be on the agenda. i'm sure my colleagues -- >> we'll join you -- >> are we me. i'm sure you are all with me! [applause] and so we've got present this in a way that it will not be dismissed as a civil rights rhetoric or coming together and coming up with something new. we have got to be -- >> the president speaking wednesday. if it is a session of reflection and motivation, in -- we must be motivated. but we're --

[inaudible] legislation and appropriation political moment now. that's simply an appeal for those who have reasonable power to people at least be arguing -- let the right react to the institutional right to vote. the right to bear pistol. let them right -- that's my appeal. >> thank you, jesse jackson! [applause] >> thank you to our panelists. weren't they wonderful? [applause] i need to make a couple of announcements. one is immediately following this reception, there's a reception next door in constitution c and d. we hope you will join us for that. to help with the expense, and we

have microphone on either side. please limit your question or comment to one minute. please limit your question or comment so we can get in several before we have to end. okay. yes? >> am i recognized? >> yes, sir. my name is -- [inaudible] i'm from montgomery, alabama. a couple of things. one, i would hope that we waste no time in trying to get these confirmed to get more black and good thinking white judges on the bench. because of everything you said this afternoon. since we have lost section 4 and section 5, we then need to be sure to get the judges on the bench. what will happen in my state, we get the republicans name as the dog gone judge. that's what happens. behave a democratic president and wind up with a republican in senators recommended the judges. that's not good. so we need to spare no effort on

that. number two, i have third seconds left. [laughter] number two, i agree with everything reverend jackson said. one, i think you need to be a little slow with it. i'm not saying we ought to take a position question whether we have the fundamental right to vote under the 50th amendment. i say we ought to let somebody else tell us we have the right. we oughted to assume it and raise all kind of hell. but i have some serious reservations about what we ought to take a position that we may or may not have the fundamental right to vote under the 15th amendment. they have been telling us pretty good for the last couple of months. about four and five. campaign for america's future. >> yes. >> and speech writer, good to have you here. >> i want to thank the panel.

it's a terrific panel. i would like you to talk about the insult quotient that people should have. the whole theory about this stunning thing think they can suppress the right of people to vote with the tricks, they assume that the people who are registered won't be insulted enough to come out in larger numbers. so there's a millions of people across the country who are registered and don't vote. there are african-americans who are registered and don't vote. they are saying we a siewm you are so -- assume you are sos passive we can suppress the ease of those who are not registered to vote we can name harder for the young to vote and make it more difficult for the elderly poor to vote. and you won't do anything about it. so i think i like people to

address the insult quotient. it changes the calculation. if people are insulted enough and come out to vote in large numbers, they will pay the penalty. >> let me respond to that. in the last election, i can't tell you how many reporters -- just don't seem to be excited enough election is not about excitement. it's about business! it was just amazing the number of -- you know when you talk to them they didn't think we were going to come out and vote because, you know, we already done that. no, there's more at stake. we have to look at the supreme court and know he who has the goal make the rule. and we need more goal on the supreme court. >> yeah. we cannot blame anybody for our own voter. there's nobody we should try to point a finger at. we need to look within.

when we see our relatives and neighbors with apathetic about voting. we know we unless we communicate with them. when we see that, i have to call people on the carpet. >> the record vote when we voted we outvote everybody. >> that's right! >> what is the basis of north carolina and texas and south carolina taking it back in fact. they can't do it unless -- >> they can't do it unless we let them. and if they do do it, our legislative remedy is to get out there and vote them out of office. >> let he try to -- let me -- let me follow my good brother. the question was brilliant. you're talking about if we had a scale, the insult quotient that get people so indignant they realize that their own dignity

or their own purpose is being insulted, and i just i think part is information. i agree that people are not -- they are being insulted. let me give you -- i come from texas and i can give you a long list. but since this is so fresh, and i think this tightens the insult any north carolina voter can challenge you standing on the voting line and ask you are you sure you are able to vote? make that a national a national phenomena. in addition, voters are insulted all the time. one of the other provisions is if you make a mistake there are many. the thing about regional polling places. if you have a voter -- if it is current and wind up

down the strait and around the corner and that is not necessarily a polling place, but document you live in detroit detroit houston or washington, d.c., or live in atlanta or live in chicago let it vote! let. it be you can vote! i will acknowledge. threat be! but they have laws that say if you can't find your polling place, you can't vote. if you have a provisional ballot under the law, this law, you can't use the provisional ballot. if you made a mistake and went to the wrong polling place. i think that is the insult quotient. i would end on saying that we do well when we don't remind people of the precious right to vote. it covers all races, color, and creed. we're not here to discriminate, we're here not here to say this woman can vote and this one cannot. don't fell -- tell me i cannot vote or don't tell my brother he cannot vote. there should be no description

in voting. that's the insult. i think we remind people there are a trying to block you from voting and that for your own dignity, your own work, your own "i am an american" quotient. then that should be the level of insult that says nothing is going to keep me from voting as an american. >> she's -- [inaudible] we have the right vote in '65. we didn't get it in 1990 because of jerry -- you have the right to vote and can't win if they draw you out. they got to run thrown out of the legislator. they ain't coming back unless we move in the sense of urgency. they are going keep run of the mill. they'll cut you out. if latinos can fall in texas,

they could real fast, the reasonable chance look at 1896 major black mix. half our black and brown caucus would not come back next year unless we win the fight this fall. >> we have another -- refned, i'm adding to what you're saying. >> [inaudible] i'm chair of the d.c. -- and i'm also secretary -- [inaudible] quote, this is most amazing proposition that has ever brought forward by a lawyer. if -- [inaudible] it could change the outcome and voting process in the united states. i'm quoting you, john conyers. mr. gourden raises some weighty issues having to cowith the consequences or result of the electorial system with minority -- [inaudible] winner take all system.

i'm quoting direct judge henry h kennedy. the electorial college. gordon versus the clerk of the house of representatives in challenging southern states and winner take all basis that do not simply have a winner take all statute in the state law. it's said you must be in that case, award them [inaudible] the first reconstruction to file the suit. it was highlight bid the congressional research service or fired by the naacp, the aclu. you all know that. i'm here. anyone from north carolina, i'm

covering georgia. who does not have a winner take all. they have -- [inaudible] no matter what you do with the voter id law. you get the alabama. i'm missing alabama, next -- north carolina, and south carolina. see me after wards. you can file a motion to end the opinion and join my suit right now. it won't cost you anything. i've already paid the bill. >> thank you very much. your minute is up. >> your minute is up. >> no, it's not. you gave that man over there two minutes. [laughter] i'm going to close right now. i want you to understand that the constitution -- a percentage of this franchise -- [inaudible] i'm the only one who filed a sense of suit.

-- [inaudible] they can't threaten me from being disbarred. i can do this. if you're from alabama, north carolina, or north carolina, please see me and i will give you the information you need to join this suit! >> thank you. >> if you in georgia, alabama, and florida for it what are you going do about california and new york? that's another problem you've got. >> my -- my minute now, baby. i'm jo ann -- [inaudible] i'm jo ann from detroit. [inaudible] exaggerated. let me hurry up and say that. emergency management in michigan should be added. 52% -- 52% of blacks in michigan all over michigan everyone there is the -- [inaudible]

the voter j.d. -- id is terrible. taking away early voting is terrible. when anybody on this panel and anywhere else talk about voter suppression, you must so add what is happening with the emergency management. it's straight up voter suppression added to that. the right to work business is jurched -- undercutting organize labor. the state where uaw is founded and organized labor has been taught. it's not just somebody's right to work. it's a right to work for nothing. right to work with no benefits and also they tear down the union because they're the ones who -- the candidates. it's an attack on the man in the white house. -- political leadership. >> also attack on working people. anybody care to respond is. >> it's happening in louisiana right now under a different

name. there's a black man down there right now being paid to take over black cities in louisiana doing the same thing they have done in michigan. we will not have the kind of turnout we've had had in previous years make sure we add emergency management and other list to voter suppression. >> i would like to -- jo ann watson, jo ann watson, counselwoman from detroit, give her a round of applause! [applause] we are -- [inaudible] we challenge the institutional -- which suspends every elected official from his position of voting as he said himself he is a benevolent dictator.

[inaudible] >> right. we need to organize at the national level because what is happening in began can happen -- >> refned jackson -- >> just said me name. >> the department of justice is, i think, moving with us, they haven't acted on it yet. >> congressman john? >> we have similar things taking place in georgia in dekalb county. the school board has been remove bid the governor. he's replaced them with his own picks. these kinds of moves have been sanctioned by the voters. when they put these constitutional amendment on the ballot, they tend to be long and it's hard to understand them, but somehow we have to be to be

get the word out that some of the initiatives that people vote yes for i personally vote no for it just about everything if i can. if maryland understand it, i'm going vote no. when we say yes to these constitutional amendments, you know, these kinds of things are the result. and so we have to watch everything that we vote for. and we have to use -- >> >> it appears we are being paralyzed from so many problems from so different areas. my concern is that we take up the gan let -- we have to have concrete. we are going to be working on with -- [inaudible] that is and the young people we don't have we have to find a way to bring them in to one arena. and i would like to see some

leadership here and brother jackson, sheila jackson come up with an approach from here concrete approach you suggest we take. i felt so bad when mlk was in a jail and they said you can come out of jail if you call on the dogs from out of state. in effect, that's what they were saying. we need stay in jail until a time we have come up with a concrete plan that we could care -- and not really come up with a plan. thank you. [applause] >> tell us your name, please. >> good evening. my name is -- [inaudible] i live in virginia. i have a comment as a private

citizens. it goes back to the discussion about what we can do in the different neighborhood and as it relates to voter suppression. i have always helped register voters, worked on campaign. what i did for the presidential election last year was serve as a poll worker, and there's not lot of diversity in being a poll workers. it's one of the most rewarding things you do. because it helps you understand the process, especially if you work from beginning to end and you can see how the votes are counted. so i want to offer that up to everyone. especially lip since virginia is a battleground state. thank you. [applause] >> i'm great. good evening. i have three suggestions to add to your list of things. from alabama, we were here supreme court -- we've had buses and protests

ever since. we have not stopped. as a matter of fact, the only organized -- we need more media attention to what we're doing in the south. we are being locked down. our people from the south can tell you we have not stopped. we have -- we had have a funeral procession, the end to vote and the resurrection ceremony. we need media attention and people outside the south join us. on august 6th, we have a major demonstration in the state. so another thing we suggest we have to be connected. there are people who are here we need to know from the grassroots level in our states for the first time we are working with mississippi, georgia, alabama and louisiana, even tennessee. that's where we're going to be on august 6th. it was the birthday of the voter

registration voting the right act. there was not enough national. we were active in the south. we needed some more national. august 6th is when brother johnson signed the bill. we got an organization. we were working for the first time groups that never worked together in alabama were working together. we are strongly supported and want you to support a national voting rights act. we are there every day. we celebrate everything else. but to help educate people we are hoping that tomorrow those of you goat -- [inaudible] call for a national voting rights act that everybody can participate in. the last -- [applause] the last suggestion, we also are going have to jubilee every year. reverend, you have never mentioned -- you are there. we need you to come! it must be to protest the march. s the march 6, 7, 8 ted. we are prepared for the 50th. we are commemorating a through a is no longer there.

we want that reenacted. we want your strength and support for that. the last suggestion is -- i have one more suggestion. oh. we will be having a series of events, work with the legal defense. they are asking if you said we are asking every state to organize the quantity of committed -- [inaudible] watchdog in their state and so there's a central place where all of this information can be processed. and if you want to find out more about the jubilee. you can go on our website. >> i'm frank watkins from washington, d.c. reverend jackson is advocating that we add a new constitutional

amendment guaranteeing the right to vote. add that to the constitution. there's actually concrete legislation in congress, congressman mark has introduced that legislation house joint resolution 44. what each of the four members of congress that are on this panel be willing to become cosponsor of that legislation that would add the right to vote to the constitution? >> yeah. -- we would with reverend jackson there is no explicit right to vote stated in the constitution. it's implied, kind of like the right to privacy. but there certainly would be no harm in understanding the gentleman spoke also from a tactical standpoint to say that we need a constitutional

amendment. could call folks to say, okay, you don't have it. you are admitting you don't have a right vote. that the time, i think i would be in a favor of a constitutional amendment making explicit and clear that everyone -- every citizens has right to vote. which is embedded in the constitution at first. we did not have the right to vote, and so that would be -- i'll look at that piece of legislation and see whether or not it's something that i feel good about. >> and frankly, reverend jackson's point goes beyond asking americans and latinos right to vote no u.s. citien has an affirmative explicit,

individualized constitutionalized right to vote under that view. any other comments about constitutional amendments? now that process is very difficult. >> i think you just get the point, there is no affirmative right to vote in the constitution at all. that may be the drawing card that we need to utilize, because we want to be careful that we don't say that we do not have a right to vote, i also believe in affirmative defenses. to make the argument when you broaden it and say there is no constitutional right. we should have everybody rushing forward saying let me vote for it. it needs recognition that is vital. as we make that argument that is a posture to answer. from the green's comment. i understand his concern. >> thank you, congresswoman, yes, sir? we can't take anymore

questions. those at the mic we can do these. >> my name is mark. i'm long time state legislate -- legislator. of the committee that jurisdiction over voting rights. i very much appreciate the panel giving me a whole agenda for the remander of this legislative session. i support the constitutional -- we thought have a constitutional amendment provided for a constitutional right to vote in pennsylvania. ..

and i very much appreciate this panel. [applause] i am here on behalf of the university agency. our students are talking about the same thing you are discussing now that we are not sure how to do something about it. and i am pretty sure that my counterparts at home, at school, at other agencies would be willing to help you. reaching out to you and the agency's need your help, too because we are they don't know

how to start the fight against because we are scared. we don't want them to take the university's and i was always told not to go into a fight thinking you were going to lose it. i am the vp on the board. >> with the rainbow/push coalition staff asked steve jones somebody will be down to see you to help to get organized before the end of september. i pledge on that. [applause] >> she said a minute ago registered to vote, but the pent plus loans attack the students this year. 16,500 fewer and there was no

rush to protect them. you add to that, the summer pell grant is being cut. they couldn't stay in school and couldn't work said they are asking them to vote, but not protecting them to stay in the schools. and then that creates a crisis in confidence. that's how we need to vote lower the voting. they have more about it than we do. we thank you for the question except the fact that you are and how word just by standing there and to indicate to those of us that in the audience that we need to help rainbow push and others that if we live in the community and they are asking to give guidance, we can go over there and begin to talk through his how you organize because all of you have been organized some

way somehow. but i do want to give you the courage because the per view a&m in a state of texas sets the standard for the students to vote. the supreme court case i encourage you all to mcdougal and will be inspiring because without the effort of the students marching i'm not sure if they got the word on how to organize its and so i would say the simple task that you could do if you find something wrong if you just get the students to begin to feel empowered, that ultimately was set on the 1963 march to get the accommodation built past. the march could get something whether it is keeping the school from being closed and the everyday they face the threat of closing and face the threat emerging we already know that young people have laid the groundwork currently.

we are so proud of those young people. they went in to the governor's office and stayed in the governor's office until they agreed to the hearing on stand your ground. and everybody participated. reverend jackson went to see them. and i can tell you people even in egypt sent them food so they got involved and they got the attention of all over the world. >> on that hard floor all night.

>> philip ag knew that is leading the struggle isn't new, when philip was about your age there was a young man named martin lee anderson that got killed and some kind of a juvenile facility in florida and phil let added new protested and picketed and march with us over ten years ago and he is leading this movement now. >> let me say something else about the student plus loan. it's 28,000 students that were out of school, not 16 just to be accurate. and the historical black president and the congressional caucus working with the department of education and arne duncan. let me tell you something we have proven as the people that we can elect people. we have to make them accountable there is no reason, no reason

whatsoever. maybe you don't understand that. i am a parent. i have my credit card 60 days behind so i'm going to cut off the student loan to get that child would say that dog won't hunt to bigot [applause] it's giving the worst economic times in the history of the united states. they have put out and i mean they told the students in september, the students that were in school they were put out of school because they didn't have the funds. that was your department of education arne duncan. an alabama state, a&m and almost a thousand. now on the 2000 students that

got cut. more house faculty had to go on furlough during the spring break there is $168 million because the parent plus loans pity if you want students to be involved, it has to mean something. a vote for me but don't deliver for me. it doesn't compute. can i get a witness? [applause] >> someone came up to me and said they lost $7 million. we have been talking about this for months. all of the schools, they lost a thousand students. some of the point of the matter is the problem have not been rectified still a problem. this is still the policy of the

department of education. and let me tell you what they did pivoted they changed the rules. in order to change the rules you should have a public hearing. they did it in house. that is incorrect. and we -- okay. my attorney says it's illegal. a couple attorneys to follow me around. they see it is illegal. we need to deal with the department of education. and i hate to say it, but we also need to call on the president to tell him to have arne duncan has stepped down. we have our final comment of the evening to the >> stepped down i mean policy. >> we have a final comment and then reverend jackson will come for some closing remarks. yes, ma'am. >> i am the reverend and i am honored to be in your presence.

i am a film maker and actor and also a survivor of child slavery. one of the things i love about dr. king and how he was able to rally people in this time to get people on one a court to move these things in exponential ways is that he said he cannot drive out heat. only love can do that and darkness can not drive out darkness. only love, but i minister and council young people every day from 5-years-old to 6-years-old. but if they've been in trafficking the number one traffic victims are black girls and women and some of my youngest clients are 5-years-old with little experience is to get i am a survivor myself. and if we can touch young people with a heart of love and rally them to understand what would be lost in the full year but the voting rights act a lot of people i speak with and have a blog with 7,000 from around the world in the country is don't

understand what will be lost. they don't understand the issue and they don't understand the breakdown of what happens slowly and what really been lost. i live in florida and a couple restoration houses so my comment is s to as the reverend said earlier to bring something down but we need to let them know what would be lost if we lost in this five-year and what is to gain if we continue to fight because there's a lot of people better disenfranchised and not happy about what is happening now. that is my statement and comment. thank you. >> i want to express your presence and patience today.

i want to thank our congressional leaders they didn't -- thank you so much. [applause] we will talk some more about how to connect voter turnout with voter delivery. if you go to a campus that just lost 700 students because of parent plus, that is a motivation meeting. everybody gets that, right? and their cousins in a&m, they get that. more house got hit so hard they have to furlough teachers during spring break. it's real stuff and these are

schools under our nose and we use this crisis. a number of students talk about the stem regiments which is a noble thing to do but many of the kids could graduate because they couldn't stay in the school last year. they had the summer pell grant cut because why can't the kids in chicago go to alabama state? they want to make up for what happened in the fall. they couldn't stay in summer school and they couldn't get the job. and they said that vote for me. that doesn't work. something about that equation is missing. one of the big things dr. king -- please don't forget this -- many of them got killed september 12. the birmingham church september 15th blowup.

it was not just the speech but the flow of blood. frannie lou hamer couldn't make the march because she was in mississippi but they said either beat her or we will beat you. she couldn't meet this march. james couldn't make the march. he was in jail. when there was a march the people that were in the jails and the cities that day. i am anxious for us to make this an appropriation legislation he meant not just reflection and motivated. say hello reverend jackson. now here's what reverend jackson wants to do. we are having a reception next

door. [inaudible] the expense of putting all this together its $100 to get in next door. if you don't have a hundred dollars, then give 80. but we need some support and i hope that we will in all of our giving let us sustain ourselves. something that we are asking for on the collis. we can't fight the people you have to fight on the right like this. am i right about that? helped us help these children. you would like to give a hundred dollars what you stand? we need the money real bad. if you can lead get at least 100, stand. it's not personal it's just to pay the way.

[inaudible] stand up, stand up. keep standing. the rest of you that do not have an envelope, you get one too because let me tell you a little secret. we want all of you that can pay the 100, pay it. the rest of you are not going to be locked out. it's not about that. it's about we need some money. i'm not proud to beg. i'm accustomed to begging but i'm trying to appeal so i can look like an intelligent, like i'm trained. people are not trained. they are big. i know how to beg i'm not going

to. please give me that money, please. that's how you beg. let us stand together. those that can contribute, please come forward. hasn't this been a great panel? [applause] [inaudible] those who contribute, please come down before we go. let us about our heads and prayed for -- in prayer. for those of us through the storm to 50 years ago, the blood of the bees in birmingham and --

babies in birmingham [inaudible] for those who gave the last full measure making a march of our martyrs who is now spirits we embrace. the urge to those that come here or tomorrow he was a fried freedom fighter. his last trip here was in the jail to get our attention to defend the needy. thank you for allowing us to come here from around the nation and around the world on this occasion. the spirit be within the us. e.u. is a level of unity and the july.

-- joy. amen. rose. hank is getting 500. [inaudible conversations] richard baker headed the u.s. senate historical

president of, announcing today he would address the nation on tuesday laying out taking military action in syria. coming ahead of any votes next week in congress on whether to authorize military force. earlier today the president's newly confirmed ambassador to the u.n., the power, spoke about a military strike would mean. >> limited military action wouldn't be designed to solve the entire problem. not even the most ardent proponents of military intervention believe peace can be achieved through military means. but this action should have the effect of reinforcing a larger

strategy for addressing the crisis and syria. by degrading assad's capacity we will also decrease the ability to strike civilian populations by civilian means. in addition the subornation combined with ongoing efforts to upgrade the military to the devotees of the moderate opposition should reduce the regime's faith that they can kill their way to victory. in this instance the use of limited military force can strengthen our diplomacy and energized the efforts by the u.n. and others to achieve a negotiated settlement to the underlying conflict. let me add a few thoughts in closing. i know i have not address every doubt that exists in this room, in this town, in this country or in the broader international community pitting the this is the right to deviate for us to have pity we should be asking hard questions and making the lippitt traces before embarking

upon action. there is no risk free door number two that we can choose in this case. public skepticism of foreign intervention is an extremely healthy phenomenon in our democracy. a check against the excessive use of military power. the american people elect leaders for judgment and different times in history presidents have taken hard decisions to use force that were not initially popular because they believe our interest demanded it. from 1992 when the bosnian genocide started and they launched the strike that stopped the war, the public opinion opposed military action there. even after we succeeded in ending the war and negotiating a peace settlement the house of representatives reflecting the opinion voted against the troops to the nato peacekeeping mission. there is no question this deployment of american power saved lives and returned

stability to the critical region of the world and critical region for the united states. we all have a choice to make. whether we are republicans or democrats, whether we have supported past military interventions were opposed them. whether we have argued for or against such action and syria prior to this point. we should agree that there are lines in the world that cannot be crossed and limits on the murderous behavior especially with weapons of mass destruction that must be enforced. >> a panel that included former new player inspector david albright and deputy assistant defense secretary assad discuss tel and syria it could affect discussions in iran with its nuclear program. according to the panel, iran is about 12 to 18 months away from being able to quickly manufacture material for a nuclear weapon. hosted by the carnegie institute

, this is 90 minutes. >> welcome to this morning's briefing on guarding against a nuclear-armed iran, risks and diplomatic options. i am daryl kimball of the washington d.c.-based arms control association. we are an independent nongovernmental organization dedicated to providing information and policy ideas to address the world's most dangerous weapons including nuclear, chemical, biological weapons. and we publish the monthly journal arms control today. so it's good to have you all here. let me remind you all to turn off your mobile devices so that we are not interrupted before we get going. as you all know from this issue from the past decade, kuran's nuclear program has been subject of intense international concern

since the energy agency about a decade ago confirmed that iran had secretly built an enrichment plant and in the year since, iran has improved its nuclear capabilities in various ways. and over the years, iran and the united states and the other great powers of france, the u.k., germany, russia, china fumbled the opportunities to resolve the issue in the negotiated deal. in the meantime, tehran has expanded its enrichment program and other sensitive nuclear fuel cycle the activities including its heavy water reactor and even as international sanctions on iran have tightened and have an impact on iran's economy. the leaders apparently have not made a strategic decision to build nuclear weapons and they do not have to get the necessary

ingredients for building a nuclear arsenal or if they've taken other steps necessary to build a nuclear arsenal. so there is time for diplomacy to secure a meaningful deal against the nuclear-armed iran and with the august 3rd inauguration hassan rouhani as the negotiator there is a new and a crucial opportunity to achieve finally a breakthrough to achieve meaningful and practical limits on iran's in richmond program. it's sensitive project that are iaea access it program going on in exchange for the significant relief of the international sanctions that have been put in place over the years. now the leaders in washington and in tehran say they want a

diplomatic solution from our perspective, to the control association i am sure my colleagues here agree that it's time to translate those words into concrete action beginning with the next round of the p5 plus one talks with iran and the p5 plus one of course being the permanent five members plus germany which is expected to be scheduled soon perhaps within a month. there's also an important meeting on the tender 27 between iran and the international atomic energy agency to try to address the questions about the potential military dimensions of its nuclear program to that i would note that just this morning and a step towards those talks, president rouhani posted on his water account that foreign minister zarif will lead

the team which is a shift from the previous presidential approach on this from the previous approach to reduce the people here from our colleagues about that shift could mean for the irene -- iranian approach. to help the public and you all here is the policy of members understand the key issues and the history and the options, the arms control association is releasing today an updated version of a briefing book that we published earlier this year titled solving the iranian nuclear puzzle and there are copies outside on the flash drive so that we have provided for you and it is also on the web site this morning at farms kunkel.org. it goes through the key issues of history and the options up-to-date as of this week. more importantly we have to be

excellent speakers today to provide their analysis on the status of iran's mccuish iraqi devotees and the elements to provide both sides with a win-win outcome. first we are going to hear from david albright who is on my right here to beat he's the founder president of the nonprofit institute for science and international security. david and his team at isis have been a leading source of information on the nuclear programs of iran, north korea, pakistan, india, other states of concern and among other things he is going to phyllis and on the latest agency quarterly report on iran's program and its implications diplomacy in iran's nuclear capabilities. and next up will be colin kahl, associate professor of the security studies but at the edmond walsh school of public service at georgetown university where he teaches courses on

international relations and international security, the middle east foreign policy. he's also a senior fellow at the center for the new america's security and from 2009 to 2011 he served as the deputy assistant secretary for defense for the middle east. batting cleanup will be george perkovicxh which is co organizing and of course hosting the session this morning. george of course for many years has written on the nonproliferation and nuclear policy issues and he is going to provide us with his perspectives on the path ahead. with that i am going to turn over the podium to david. after david and colin and george speak for about 12 minutes or so we will turn over to you, the audience, for questions and ensure that we will get into a

robust and interesting discussion. thanks for being here. david, the floor is yours. >> as daryl said, i will be focusing on iran's program and status and some of the implications for the negotiations. mostly i will be talking about the safeguard reports which is an unclassified public document they produce every year to fulfill its responsibilities to the member states and also the u.n. security council about what it's trying to do to verify kuran's commitment, nonproliferation treaty and also whether iran is providing the solutions that called for a suspension of the centrifuge program and then the construction of the aye heavy water reactor.

obviously reports that iran is not fulfilling its obligation under the security council resolutions and it's a mixed message on the verification on its commitments namely the declared nuclear materials are accounted for about its potential for its these and possibly ongoing activities may be in violation of the non-proliferation treaty. it hasn't said they are but it certainly has raised enough concerns that its an issue that has to be addressed. one of the nice things they have been doing on the quarterly report is put in enough detail so that the member states and the interested public can actually chart the progress of the iran nuclear program. and at bob isis we try to bring

that to life and you can evaluate if things are getting worse from our perspective and fits advancing significantly were getting better in the sense that the program is going slower the last report is kind of the next bag. for us one of the most striking thing is the number of the centrifuges continues to grow quite dramatically. particularly the first generation over the last few years has doubled in number of the ir1 centrifuges and they call them the ir-2 and they now have a thousand installed and under vacuum which means they could enriched uranium at any time. the good news is that all of these recently installed centrifuges iran decided for some reason which we don't know

why not to actually use this growing centrifuge capability that is essentially an riches in the same number that it's enriched for the last two or three years and again, we don't know why, but to us that is a positive bill that can be making a lot more 20% enriched uranium which is the most sensitive material right now than they are right now. and so, another metric we use has been a conflict of the critical capability. it's kind of a deterrent policy as articulated by obama to prevent iran from seeking nuclear weapons. how well can that policy worked? from our view it works best if what you are really trying to do is.

what happens after that is when to be extremely difficult to work with. it may take several months to make a nuclear weapon but you have no mechanism to know where that is going to happen. iran knows how to make a weapon and was working on more sophisticated nuclear weapons and so they have a head start. but the bottom line is if you are trying to deter them from breaking out and making fun of weapons-grade uranium, then you want to have adequate warning of that and so the idea of critical capabilities when you can reach the point you are going to lose that ability to have the warning. and what does that mean? the ability to go in and strike militarily and stop iran from actually finishing making enough weapons-grade uranium for the weapons. we think that determines in this sense is in effect now it would

take them if they use all their centrifuges and all the 20% in the form it still make the leap to want to break out and this is a minimal estimate it could take longer if they have problems with enrichment which happens a lot in iran that amount is enough when critical capability comes in the new or in the regime made by the inspectors access and doing some other things that it would make it hard to actually detect or from the intelligence capability to detect it. so based on their progress made 2014 is on the would reach a critical capability. then at that point i think obama's deterrence policy would face serious challenges if it is intended to be toward iran from

actually crossing the line. we don't see anything in the report that actually changes the thank you also, on another bad news -- the continue to have no progress on weaponization and other military nuclear issues peeping it i mean, the thing that has got the limelight in the last two years has been the parchin site, but that's only a small part of the issue. i mean, the iaea for whatever reason decided to focus on parchin, the weaponization and the military nuclear issues are much broader than parchin and in a sense the focus on parchin in the last two years has kind of allowed the focus on these broad set of issues to be reduced. and in this report is asserting that it wants that back and it laid out some of its positions to bring back a more realistic view of how to deal with those issues and i think that with all of this activity in parchin if

you follow that which essentially is a site that had no activity for years to visit and then suddenly all kind of construction activity starts to take place. things are taken out of the building and there's all kinds of water being used which could either be washing down facilities or cooling equipment that's cutting up for so you have seen the asphalt of the site recently. there isn't a lot of asphalt of the facilities and parchin. it is planning a large parking lots. it's not normal. the bottom line is they can't do much. very likely they will get an ambiguous result and i think we are stepping back. in this report to say that it's a much bigger issue. >> to put in context what you are talking about is with parchin the site of the suspected tests. >> it could be related and the

iaea effort over the last two years to clarify that question and other questions of the potential military activity hasn't made progress and for the first time in this report as you are saying the iaea les of several steps that iran could take to help clarify that and as i said at the beginning the next meeting is planned piece of timber 27 -- september 27. if they want to help achieve that. >> and hopefully rouhani will make the right decision. without solving this weaponization it is hard to believe that you can settle this issue. i mean you certainly can get short-term deals, but without solving the weaponization, you are not getting to the core concern that iran had a nuclear weapons program and is it stopped that program? and international community has ways of dealing with that and

honesty about past activities doesn't lead the punishment it leads to increased confidence and that's played out in south africa and brazil and other countries and the important condition to achieve and hopefully rouhani will come clean on that. part of the problem though is that rouhani is the one that set this up in 2003 or was involved in setting the coming clean on the whole set of activities and hiding weaponization. so it's very skilled that he's going to make a different decision now. i'm sure i'm running out of time. okay. yes, another good news is they didn't increase their stock of the near 20% of the low-enriched uranium hexafluoride which they have laid down as a red line and

get it but to under 40 to 2050 kilograms then israel will supposedly do something. and the way that iran can avoid that is number one, stop making it, which it's not doing, or the other is to convert it into oxide form for the use in the reactor fuel for the reactor and the iran is following the latter. and so the amount is being produced and has stayed about the same but it is sending more off to the conversion facility and that is seen as a positive development. it's also not signed in iran does respond to pressure. i think that is one of these advantages and the situation is that iran can be detoured and can be changed through the various pressure tactics we saw that and 03 where they radically

changed their approach and you see that in this limit on the 20% enriched uranium production for at least limiting the stockpile of the hexafluoride form. it doesn't mean the stop the program at all. another positive step all the waste don't think that this should be overplayed. iran is proud and often will say things about its nuclear progress that isn't realistic and so a couple months ago in the last report or the one before it said it would pretty rapidly start the heavy water reactor. and in this report it's clear that they cannot start on that schedule and they lay their startup date to the id that reactor is important because the

reactors in the middle east already won an iraq in 1980 and in syria in 2007 won what expect israel to bomb the reactor, too and could be a way to get into the military option. so if you want to see this reactor operation delayed you don't need they don't need the reactor and it's just from my point of view it as a disruptive element where it creates another timeline that could lead to the military and also pose a dilemma for israel. are they not going to vomit and allow it to operate? and i think it would create a dynamic that could increase the chance of the strike.

>> the heavy water actor especially from the proliferation perspective because the heavy water reactors is better suited for the plutonium production. that couldn't have been for some time. the have chosen to use the kind of core that is an ideal to make the weapons-grade plutonium. the cord design is a field design by the russian entities back in the 90's when russia was working more intensively with iran's nuclear program. it's not ideal. and iran has no reprocessing capability that we know of right now and you need that to separate the plutonium from the fuel. we have viewed the reactor serious but we don't see it as serious as the centrifuge

program and in that sense you want to cap the enrichment out of the program will use the term separate work you want to cap it at a much low level than it is now to read you want to roll back not a suspension necessarily but able back in their number of centrifuges because you don't want to keep the devotee there that could -- if the agreement is and working it could lead to a huge surge in the production and 20% and be used in a breakout and so we think it's important to reduce the number of centrifuges. two years ago rouhani said that

they had constructed a third centrifuge plan and they would keep that sustention in place until the summer or until two years and that the years is passed to the question remains whether iran is building a third centrifuge plan and given the number of centrifuges that it has been installing the time come you have to worry that they could do it if they wanted. and they don't have the mechanisms to know. and iran has refused to allow are you going to cover the notification? >> i was going to see the test to be the deal but i wasn't going to go back -- >> okay i will leave it to george. but if that is an issue that remains -- and then the last one is always iran making all these centrifuges? there is a lot of effort to prevent them from buying things. there's a lot of success in protecting their procurements of the vital goods for the

centrifuge. they need to buy a lot. you see a lot of efforts. there's interdictions. but they have been getting what they need to the and i think that at isis we used to think they were capped in a week. we see they have enough carbon fiber which is a vital component of the centrifuges for the thousands. they seem to have gotten some gifts that have allowed them to build a lot more than we would have thought they could bild theare not operational so we don't know if hey have all of t equpment they needed in the plant to make them operational. but they appear to be getting through the sanctions and in our work we see the two big loopholes. i will end with this. we see china not doing enough and that iran can buy their and it can buy german and french and which means it can get high-tech goods for the centrifuge program

and iran still wants those programs. we also see the e.u. has a problem where they have good control we have seen cases where -- i will give an example they went from japan to the u.s. and it was carbon fiber that went to europe to a good legitimate sale and then it sort of disappeared which is a big place and many of the countries don't have the same level of control as the white nights and then via turkey or the adjacent country to iran. we've identified the two loopholes that need to be fixed. -- be treated in much, david albright for that great summary of where the program is and what the implications are. now we are going to turn over to colin kahl to give us his take on where the negotiators might be able to go with the election of rouhani after the last round

of the p5 plus one talks which were last held back in last april. the floor is yours. >> thanks to carnegie for hosting and for all of you for coming out in the morning to listen to us. as mentioned my remarks will basically focus on three things within there is a window of opportunity and that he election not hassan rouhani to make some diplomatic progress and second with the deal might look like and how the u.s. negotiators should approach getting that deal. and then finally i will say a few words at the end about the implications of the possible military strike on syria might be for all of this because that is the great forefront of our mind at the moment. i think there is a lot of skepticism that some of the quarter some converts among the israelis as it relates to hassan rouhani. but his agenda and moderate pity if he's not a reformer or a liberal.

he's not likely to transform into a jeffersonian democracy to get he is a regime insider and has been for te entire period with the revolution that he's also pragmatist with demonstrated history of being able to forge allegiance on the controversial foreign policy issues to include the nuclear issue. it's also important to keep in mind that rouhani campaigned in that sense of everybody wanted to run after, but a lot of people voted for them and rouhani canned and on a platform of reducing iran's isolation in the international community and his opponents must especially who was iran's national security adviser and lead negotiator on the nuclear issue campaigned on the strategy of nuclear resistance to just say no to any compromise on the program so to some degree, the i iranian election was a referendum on whether the regime's current approach on the nuclear issue and on the sanctions issue was

the right approach and overwhelmingly the public said no. so there is a mandate for change. since the the election he's continued to emphasize his willingness to engage to find a nuclear compromise and he's also expressed a willingness to meet bilaterally at the high levels in the united states which is promising. he's put together a largely technocratic had net including the eink push speaking zarif who was the former u.s. ambassador during the hosni reformist era in iran. he's a well-known figure in the west and georges interactive with him personally paid but zarif will be the foreign minister and looks like he will have the lead for the nuclear negotiations with the p5 plus one although as mentioned it was breaking news on rouhani's plater feed so we will have to

see. the team also suggested the economy is worse than he imagined and now this is a standard thing for the new administration to do in all countries with lower expectations but i suspect the sanctions suggesting they are highly motivated to reduce the pressure. i think it's also important to note that in rouhani's writing and some of the speeches and remarks by his team to include zarif the mcginn is interesting argument about the weapon. it's common for the officials to say the nuclear weapons are prohibited so as a result of the supreme leader against nuclear weapons iran will never pursue that. what's interesting about your get that they have made is in the pursuit of the weapons they will be the - two kuran's security to provide dividends for iraq to strike me as an argument that they may use

stopping somewhere short of a nuclear capability at least in their internal and fight with hard-liners who may see nuclear weapons in the security interest. there are a bunch of uncertainties however about how much rouhani can do. there is a window of opportunity because of his election that we don't know how much the supreme leader will get him on the nuclear issue. the supreme leader is the ultimate decider on this issue. we don't know how the negotiations will be framed. if it is true that zarif will take the lead does that mean the p5 plus one talks need to be in the ministerial level? and the under secretary of the director level which the current talk with the dialogue would have been in the context of the p5 plus one or quietly in something else. we don't know any of these things. they are not exactly clear what type of an arrangement rouhani

might be willing to accept and more importantly to sell to the leader and other factions competing for the leaders each year in iran. rouhani has said that he is willing to have iran have the full transparency that i interpret as a combination of increased inspections on iran's program and coming to terms with the iaea on their past military. that is all good but i would say that transparency in and of itself will not be sufficient for the p-funk plus one in particular the west because there has to be fundamental limits on elon's nuclear permanent terms of levels of and richmond and centrifuges and facilities and those types of things so the transparency on that appears to be the watchword is necessary but not sufficient. it's also clear from the statement that he will not be able to sell the deal that does not in some way allow him to frame it as respecting the right to the nuclear energy which they

interpret as meaning a lot and richmond putative i think the probability of the iranian government or the regime in general agreeing to an overall compromise that calls for the probability of that happening is zero. this regime would risk a war including the united states to defend what it interprets as it's right which means it is probably not the right thing for the p5 plus one to insist upon the and we can talk about that later. daryl mentioned that the death and no date set for the next round of talks. i think that there was hope it might have ended for the u.n. general assembly. i don't think that anymore and if there is a serious strike that happens it is even less likely so things could slip further putative i will get back to the syria issue in a moment. at the talks resume there is already an offer on the table from the issue that the rounds

of negotiations. the current offer is a confidence-building measure that gets an initial agreement built upon towards the final agreement. it calls on iran for the period of six months to suspend its enrichment activities to ship out the stockpile of 20% material to agree to enhance the monitoring of some of that centrifuge production and assembly facilities and suspend activities of the plan and it's a major concern for the u.s. and israel and the readiness of that facility to get previously they've called for the move off of that. in exchange that he five plus one would provide relief from the sanctions on the petrochemicals and provide licensing for the iranian civilian aircraft and pledge to have no ulin or e.u. proliferation's sanctions for the period of the measure.

if iran agrees it would be then used to negotiate the final agreement so that is the general framework on the table. i call this small and some people called small for small and has relatively small concessions from the government and relatively little in exchange for that concession. my personal belief is it is the small can't work. it can't work because even though i think it is a fair deal from the u.s. perspective it looks like a raw deal from the i raining in perspective -- iranian perspective. and this deal asks them to give up those two most important sources of leverage but i just don't see them being able to -- i think is a fair deal objectively but i don't think it's one that the iranian leadership can accept or sell and i also feel that if the p5+1 goes back with a new negotiating team coming and with rouhani being elected to go off with the same offer it will give ammunition to rouhani's critics that his election brought them

nothing. so i don't advocate that putative some advocate we need to do more for small. that is have the same thing for the iranians. this is a terrible idea because it is a horrible negotiating tactic that sends a signal to the iranians that the longer they wait a better deal they get a which is the wrong signal to send to them. plus it the only thing that iranians really want is relief from the financial sanctions, and those are the biggest sources over iran so we shouldn't give up those sources for a small deal. some have said more for more. let's ask more for the iranians in general and offer more in sanctions relief. what would that mean? it would mean the p5+1 could offer iran significant relief on the financial front and on the oil front and insurance front in exchange for everything in the current confidence building measure, plus iran doing something with its 3.5% stock

pile come oxidizing it, shipping it out of the country, putting it in escrow something like that as well as agreeing to the tougher inspection on the additional protocol for the few years when rouhani was the nuclear negotiator in 2003 and in 2004. however, while awaiting gets smaller than the deal but for the west to give up the biggest sources of leverage, the baliles in the deacons mansion where the deal was less than complete i would rather use those for the big final deal, not for an interim deal of any size. although like i said this would be preferable to the small agreement. so what i would propose is what some people call dig for big. that is the p5+1 explicitly fleshes out a road map for the game up front instead of allowing it to the implicit which is the way that i understand it to be now. this could start in private and in a bilateral sitting between the exchange in the united states and iran. we have to see but the flesh out

a road map and what iran's program that would look like they would get in exchange and then you would have phased implementation. so instead of having confidence-building measures that build towards the final agreement he would have the road map that is implemented on the confidence-building measures. so it reverses the order of the current negotiation. ..

and iran would have to submit to much more intrusive inspection. at the very least a protocol as an additional thing. an exchange, the p5+1 would clarify that iran would be limited if current domestic enrichment, which would at least implicitly recognized a right to enrichment, at least to thought that way. they get significant sanctions, everything ulcerations related. the p5+1 would provide peaceful cooperation, alternative to the rack here, feel assemblies for the tehran research react or, the sorts of things. the p5+1 would assure a rant against the united states would have to make that pledge i would imagine, probably in private. and perhaps the united states would offer the prospect is a

long-term dialogue with your brain and on security matters in the region, something they signaled they want. i

if they have no intentions to build weapons, they should satisfied with this deal. if they have intentions and they reject the on those grounds, it would be clarifying to the international community in the united states takes military action and galvanizes much support for such action as possible in a context in which the good generous offer any rate

and still said no. speaking of military action, one or two things about syria because it's on a lot of people's minds. there is no one iranian elite are inferior. rouhani and its allies had made the case values of chemical weapons is aporia. they have not generally assign blame to anybody, and if caught for this issue. they've taken a sedate town. in contrast, however, especially among the irgc and basically said the opposition did this and if the american strike syria will lead israel on fire. this is a standard argument. i would leave they struck five times since 2007 in the rain effect on bookcase. nevertheless, it is a threat. so i did this era issue

generates friction between the moderate faction and the hard-line faction that i believe has an interest in trying to spoil both rouhani success domestically and improve relations with the west. this'll be a huge test for rouhani when and if military strikes happened. in the aggregate from the strikes could arguably hope say they are serious about preventing him from having nuclear weapons, which could add to this deterrent effect and even give rouhani an argument to push against the notion that the united states is a paper tiger, that is serious about using military action. it would harm him to make that argument. in the near term that would put them on the defensive i think i potentially allowing his adversaries to paint him as soft and weak in the face of western aggression. the answer is we don't know what the event of a strike would be, but it certainly will create a wildcard in the diplomatic.

>> thank you for that robust and detailed outline of some of the step slower. so with that, george perkovich here at carnegie, your turn. >> thank you all for coming. i want to build on what colin said out near the end in particular when he talked about the importance of going through a big for big tape deal because i agree with that premise entirely that the only way to get a diplomatic resolution of the iranian nuclear issue is going to be to put out how you actually end the crisis over this issue and that has to be big in the ways that colin suggested. trying to do a little bit at a time, confidence building incrementally doesn't work for the reasons that colin mentioned and also i would reinforce by singing, you would have -- a

president in either country would have to expend a lot of political capital to get the various opponents are skeptics to agree to anything including incremental process. neither of them will have that much political capital to spend for a series of incremental types. you have to frame how the thing and it implemented incrementally. and building out what colin said, i would add a couple of points. one is that we have to understand that the leader of iran, ayatollah khomeini is like many religiously trained people. he is obsessed with fairness over this understand came unfairness and injustice. he doesn't know details of nuclear policies. this is not peculiar to a rant.

anybody who has heads of states or foreign menace. and starts to get into details of nuclear policy issues realizes they don't follow those details. but they got the general principle. and so khomeini's principles is going to be basically, is it fair? are we being asked to give up a lot more than we are getting, number one. and number two, are they discriminating against us? are they picking on us? in terms of thinking about how to design a deal and how to approach it, i think we have to have those general principles in mind. the framework i would suggest as we think about it borrows from president reagan. those of you who remember the famous thing about negotiating arms control with the soviet union, which by the way, the people who elect to him in 1980 did not expect in the early reagan would not have been expected to be a major theater

on nuclear arms reduction, but on the second term he did that and say trust but verify. that was how we explain what they're going to do. with iran, we should distrust and verify. so not trust but verify, but distrust and verify. that is mutual, by the way. as much as we distrust iran, they distrust is a thousand times more. we talk about historical reasons for that. so under the notion of distrust and verify, what do i name? well, they say they don't want nuclear weapons. they say they want this religious armhole against it and it's not in their security interests. that's great except the u.s. government and others don't believe it. so the deal would have to pick up on what they say is their position, but verify that their

position. we don't seek regime change and we welcome them how they a peaceful nuclear program. they don't believe that and they're kind afraid. we do seek regime change, always have. the u.s. government doesn't support the islamic republic in a theocracy with the leader of the jurisprudence. so the issue is actually that the u.s. would not physically or otherwise try to bring about regime change. by the way, the rate and still support the u.s. regime or liberal democracy. we talk about corruption and so on, but the issue is they're not going to develop nuclear weapons or otherwise physically dangerous and our allies we would be physically endangering them. but we have to demonstrate that and we have to demonstrate that we actually do recognize what

they claim is a right to peaceful nuclear energy, which currently they don't believe. so i think with that kind of frame, the basic urge is for them to convince us they don't seek nuclear weapons. yes, they have to provide transparent bs we've all talked about. that means designing or implementing the additional protocol, which is kind of a stronger motive inspections at the international atomic energy agency has developed. it means going back to something david alluded to. there is a thing called subsidiary 3.1, which basically is a commitment that states make to the international atomic agency, that they will tout the agency when they are planning to build a new nuclear facility and men will provide them with design information before

construction starts, so that the agency could then monitor and have a better idea of what is supposed to be the hidden compartments underground and that you don't wait until the facility is basically constructed essay by the way, it is constructed and into mess will start enriching uranium. so this agreement is an important way to provide transparency, but also a lot of warning. iran unilaterally several years ago basically abrogated their commitment, so they have to put this back and there it has to be, as david suggested additional transparency necessary to address the questions about whether iran had done military experiments in the past and to build confidence that they would in the future. this is that david is talking about that the iaea has been trying to focus on. they're a couple important things to say. one, we've been asking iran to

come clean about its past nuclear entities in the u.s. intelligence and others believe that before 2003 at least they were doing experiments related to making nuclear weapons. we say we had to come clean. but we've never said we would indemnify them for coming clean. in other words, like every cop show with a thick tell us what you know where the guy says, his lawyer better says first you got to guarantee them you are not going to prosecute or he doesn't get the chair or whatever dizziness. we haven't done that with iran. so we say come clean. alright, so if they give is the answer is, then do we bomb them based on those answers? i've asked government officials for years about this. say look, whatever you say we want is against you and they say now, french official years ago say we haven't asked for it. said the iranians are supposed to say we tell you what we did, then what are you going to do?

it's not realistic, so we have to put that out there as part of seeking this kind of transparent to you. and partly on transparency, the leader willens says that what they do be consistent with the non-proliferation treaty, so they are not asked to do more than legally required. that will be challenging, but i think, you know, experts in this room, david and others in the u.s. government, can't come up with the non-proliferation treaty that go beyond the routine. iran is noncompliant with its obligations under the iaea. other states have been noncompliant, too. abi, south korea, egypt. so what kind of transparency and remedial steps to those countries have to take in order to satisfy the world that they were now backing two compliant with their obligations. water ran might be has to do with the way you are asking, you

know, pick a country that no one suspects. maybe there isn't such a country, but you know, routinely you are asking not to do things for which there are present. south africa is another example where south africa disarmed. they had done a lot of original like iran and then they joined the npt. to do that, they provided extra information. freeman will be asked in iran is basically important. going beyond the few cycles start that colin and david talked about has to be part of a. in other words, the nuclear non-proliferation treaty doesn't define a nuclear weapons and it doesn't define nuclear weaponization. but the world wants from iran is to have confidence they are not going to build nuclear weapons. so i think an agreement has to specify beyond the enrichment

issues, has to specify ways that we will now or limits that iran would agree to an area of research and development experiment tatian, adapting missiles sent you have confidence that they are not going to build nuclear weapons and the way to train that is some pain that rouhani offered in 2003 and 2004 when he was the chief negotiator. he came up with the phrase in negotiation with france, u.k. and germany. we will provide objective guarantees that iran may not seek nuclear weapons. that was a phrase. with that time in 2003 in 2004, the only objective guarantees you don't do enrichment or plutonium reprocessing is. so focus on the fuel cycle. does the issue of a suspension in the arena and suspended for a little while and so they broke

out. resuming the object is guarantees framework, but now we have to acknowledge that iran is going to do enrichment, which is a huge win for them. so you have to go to them and say look, you want, saturday. in 2003 this was the issue when you're insisting he would give up, wouldn't suspend. you also agree there had to be object is guarantees. so now that you're doing enrichment, with eight layers of objective guarantees that somehow compensate for what you want, which is the biggest objective guarantee that you wanted. some of that has to be in the area of weaponization, where iran would specify the kinds of things they would virchow, which at a minimum would include the experiments that the iaea is worried about that they did in the past and also benchmarking of transparency about what in fact they did in the past.

the weaponization site needs to be looked at. these guys talked about the iraq reactor, the heavy water reactor. a couple brief points i'm not. it's very helpful if americans and israelis and others don't emphasize this a lot, especially publicly like the great dread of the iraq dirt and we have to that react or because it just drives the price up in iran when you do that. and so, keeping them as low-key as possible is important. it is worth exploring in addition to them, not building the reactor, are there technical modifications that could be done or are there ways this could be operated and verified at lower power or how long they keep the feel on the reactor or could you switch the core virtue of their modifications so that the reactor continued to exist, concerns about usability could

be a jazz. on the right to enrich, which iran has insisted upon as colin said, they will have to say they want even if we don't put it in those terms. i would modify that innocent than my colleague has suggested, which is basic way the right way to think about it is the right to make fuel for peaceful purposes and reactors. enrichment is just a means to an end. so i fetishize it? the issue is the right to make fuel. one of the reasons why this is important as there could devalue and then saying that iran and other countries, who would do enrichment should turn the product and to feel immediately or take the quantity of the product they are enriching to the quantity of the fuel they need and can make. by focusing on the fuel issue

rather than enrichment or sad, if this is going to be a model, it has greater value. last point just building on bacall and handset. clearly what is in it for a ran as i alluded earlier, they're worried about regime change. that's what they think sanctions are about to especially heavier sanctions. so that has to be -- a schedule and a plan for removing those sanctions absolutely has to be part of the arrangement. he made implemented incrementally, just like they would what we want incrementally. you have to give them a map in the schedule and a trade-off by which those sanctions would, and that's the most material way we could demonstrate to the leader in fact this isn't about regime change. it's about the nuclear program. if they take steps, those sanctions would come off via

last thing i would say unless they are to set that last thing, in which case i'm sorry. we naturally focus, in washington, are the reigning is ready to make a deal? i think it is at least as difficult to ask whether the united states would be prepared to make a deal in 19 implemented to the bipartisan cooperation, which means to the extent that congress would go along with providing some of the trade-offs that the iranians would insist from the u.s. because it is relieving sanctions is going to require that cooperation. i think we have to look long and hard at whether this town is prepared in these political parties are prepared to deliver on our end of any deal.

either way, this is a question geraniums want to know. we always want to know what about their politics than with the leader go on and the revolutionary guard and are we being duped? they are saying great i can negotiate with obama, but he can't get a budget, can't do this. so what makes us think that if we negotiate this with you, you're not going to pocket what we offer on our side and then you're not going to deliver on your side. so that is a big challenge for us. thank you. >> thank you, george. you just heard a lot of very good ideas on the iran nuclear issue. let me just underscore a couple key points i am hearing and then we'll get to the questions of justice sector. as david said, iran's nuclear program is advancing slowly in some areas, quickly and other

areas. so there is time for diplomacy still. but that time can't be squandered. as we heard of george and colin, both sides need to exhibit more creativity. more realistic thinking of the key issues. we can't simply. there is a new team in iran. the more positive words need to be tested out and talks need to begin soon. and the syria crisis is going to affect things and it certainly is going to put it down i am the p5+1 talks. the diplomatic option remains the best option as difficult as it is, diplomacy is never easy

and the other thing we need to keep in mind, we did talk about this here, maybe in a q&a people talk about the military option on the threat of military strikes. i think it may be others in the panel have thoughts on this that military strikes in the context of a ran as a false option in a sense that it can't end the program unless we are willing to put his on the ground and as you can see from this. do they, a lot of people have a lot of hesitation about cruise missile strikes against limited site. so diplomacy and the option on the table is a critical period for all parties to finally make progress for the situation on the ground with the centrifuges and becomes more challenging sometime next year. so with that, let me open up the floor to your questions. there are a couple of folks on this side that have microphones.

ask us to raise your hand, identify yourself. we will start hearing stage right. please let us know who you'd like to answer your questions. >> jazmine ramsey from enterprise service. this question is for mr. albury. i wonder if you could clear way for me what we're supposed to be watching for the breakout capability in iran and is the assessment that they haven't been able to dance those moments of their program or that they are purposefully slowing it down? thank you. >> the breakout capability is found in the could do at any time. they could just decide we want to make at the facilities and just do it, but they are not and that could be for many reasons. one of the reasons is they now if they want to make weapons

grade uranium, they would probably suffer an attack. so when that sense, they are deterred. they may also not feel a need. they may not have any -- is still mentioned commissars we can tell, they haven't made a strategic plan to build nuclear weapons so they see no need to do it. in terms of what we are watching as we may reach a capability where they can do it without being given a timely manner because president obama said he wants to prevent iran from getting nuclear weapons and it hasn't been clear about what that means, that one of the things is that a ran procedure, he wants some strategy to stop them. what we are lucky not as if you're going to do that tonight is your policy, it's a lot easier to stop them is what we are talking about is preventing them from getting weapons grade uranium. and a sense, the long paula of

the town and getting nuclear weapons. you don't want a policy that says they've got weapons grade uranium or maybe enough for one or two bombs. we don't have any idea where it is in the u.s. is going to stop iran from turning the weapon grade uranium into nuclear explosive device. maybe i'll take three months, maybe two years. who knows. there is no mechanism that is clear that could deter arraignment doing that. you could destroy the entire country, but if the policy is to prevent iran from getting nuclear weapons, it's a lot easier to destroy four or five nuclear facilities involved in the breakout than trying to in essence bring a ran to its knees and surrender in a sense to give up this weapon grade uranium they have. so what we watch as maybe they have the capability and plays that would allow them to break out without being detected.

[inaudible] >> no, it would be potentially a secret centrifuge site. again, we look at the policy framework. this is an argument for war. but we try to do is to find things that would prevent military strikes, that we don't see that as in any way a desirable option. the u.s. government has laid out a position that he wants to prevent iran from getting nuclear weapons and that inevitably brings the military options of what we try to think through is what does that mean? when does the policy work optimally? when does it not work so optimally and that's why we came up this idea of looking a critical capability because we think if they reach a critical capability, did not affect the ability to implement this deterrence policy. >> if i could pile on for one

second because this is an important question not very well understood or articulated in the wider discourse on this. the administration has said an iranian nuclear weapon during this truth a mistress weapon is unacceptable. at times the president described this is a red line. during the third presidential debate last year, obama had a carefully crafted well thought through statement that he would not allow iran to get a breakout. it wasn't immediately apparent how he operationalize sidedness mine, but based on statements he's made in other administration officials have made to include dni clapper, the point at which iran could move so rapidly towards producing that they could not be given time to be stopped, even as they did so at open nuclear facilities. the breakout capability were to cause a critical capability to basically -- to have been for the fuel for the weapon in plain

sight. the issue then becomes one might a hit that threshold and under some worst-case scenarios on current trendlines, they might hit it sometime in 2014. the issue is not whether a ran there for in 2014 will necessarily make the decision to -- for nuclear weapons. the probability is that they won't, but they might. the issue is more from a u.s. base. this may become the last moment at which the intelligence community could come with high confidence in the know would make move towards nuclear weapons. if we lose the ability to detect when they would move, the ability to prevent nuclear weapons goes down dramatically in the military option is off the table. in my mind, this is very much a decision point for us. this is about when is the last time -- when we know we've exhausted diplomacy? some people don't agree with that. if my argument is right and

where david is right for me put that star in the calendar and cebit 2014, whatever your assessment as and say that the amount of time i have to get a diplomatic deal. that means you have 12 or 18 months. let's get on with it. >> or other steps that would have to be taken for air and to build not just for nuclear weapons but several nuclear weapons. the problem is that the iaea is probably not able to detect that because that could be done in secret and not under safeguards. the u.s. intelligence community may have capabilities, but the guarantees that they'll provide to the president are going to be much lower. that's why david is referring to critical capability, but it doesn't mean that is when iran will build nuclear weapons at all. that's not what he means. other questions. barbara slaven right here and we'll take others.

>> thanks. barbara slaven from the atlantic council. forgive me if you discussed it before i came in. i want is your evaluation of why iraq is slowing down. is this deliberate on the part of the iranians not to be provocative? with the paving over of preaching, is that now going to be impossible to determine what happened that? finally, there is a mean between iran and the iaea between the 27th or 28 and i'm beginning to understand the iaea has seven items that he wants to discuss it there and. are you aware of that george? are you aware of that, darryl? can you give us information about what the iaea is giving up? >> i think they are slowing down their announcements of when it's

going to start. they couldn't have met them in any case. debate a certain number of fuel from waste by this august. this will be 55 fuel assemblies. they need about 150 for a full carload. they also -- we're not even sure. they haven't put the quick and the reactor they depended on procurement for the reactor and it's not clear they have everything together for that reactor yet. we don't have a lot of information in the iaea can look at the react to her and see what they are. it's slower on feel, so they just are being more realistic and announced the delay. we've watched this debate and none parching, we've really been trying to figure out what's going on. i'll be honest, we don't know what was done in that chamber.

people speculated. we've looked at three possibilities of what could've happened. and we don't know which of those three it could be. typically people who have been attacking the iaea on the second pick in one echo and after it, but the iaea has never said that instead test that happen. the only statement that clearer is there a high explosive tests for the allocation of high explosive tests related to the development of nuclear weapons. and so therefore, we don't know if you can detect anything. with the amount of work done there, i would give it a low probability. i think people over it and environmental monitoring can do. it's a powerful tool, but i can tell you the successes have often been at the mistakes of yet are scary. so you take an example in iran, where they detect a big city

facility called kalaye electric. there were several buildings they are. when they cleaned up very well painted, reduce surface is commended walls. what happened as he ran for god to redo something in another building. it didn't clean out a ventilation duct and that's really found it. and so, iran knows that it made a mistake. from our point of view, next time this came up, they actually took down a facility that dated to the military dimensions of the program and they just removed it and they created a sports complex they are. and that parchin we don't know what they're doing, but it's very suspicious. i am not optimistic.

if there is, iran has done so much of this i am aware that you can detect it. [inaudible] >> well, no. i think you have to move on. you tried something else. it's called the physics research center. you look at procurement information and there's a lot of good polling information that allows you to ask a whole series of questions about what happened at that site. if iran does something that blocks you come you don't just keep throwing yourself against the wall. i think that's one of the things that has to happen. one of the issues iranians raised his basics to see at this time they do want a rant for procurement in these possible military dimensions. iran has announced a year or two ago that it would talk about procurement anymore. they do want iran to reverse

itself in dubai to talk about procurement and that's one of the ways to get around some of these walls. >> okay. just very quickly, barbara. we've got other questions. [inaudible] >> the report talks about what they need to accomplish. >> an example would be the vast -- the iaea makes mistakes. i personally think they made a mistake in such an explicit way because given the history, it was almost guaranteed that he ran with start repaving everything in between things down. they should have thought this through a set of my deeply. but on the question, they think are trying to get iran to set down and negotiate and that the seven statements are important. one was look, we are investigators.

we're not going to tell you everything we know. what kind of prosecutor would go in and reveal all the evidence to the accused? and so, iran has sent to you give us all information, we will talk to you. again, parchin is an example. we have to go there and all the sudden construction activity. the iaea is making it clear we want to solve this, but they're certain conditions we need not appear one at pairwise to tell us everything we need to know because that is part of our investigatory tool to find info. >> why don't we move onto the next question. yes, sir, right in front of you. >> michael, sturmer state department. at nike to elaborate on your last comment, even if one is able to negotiate a big deal, how one could sell it in the respective domestic political context. we've seen in the rain in case of a particular leader or

faction is seen as making progress, but others will calm and pull them down and prevent them from moving forward as you suggest that is the same thing facing print and obama perhaps in this context. how do you do that? secondly, in the negotiations themselves, the experience over the years as iranian interactions has shown the importance of personalities that i can put it that way, in terms of the personal care eristic sublease negotiators were interlocutors, whether they click, whether they fit with one another. i've heard one negotiator in mirkin described as, you know, he's just mechanical. he's not human. >> what difference will it make for instance?

[inaudible] >> read to see you, mike. we go way back to pakistan 20 years ago. so in agreement and the u.s. context. a couple things. i think it's very important in people here i'm sure have done it or are doing it to map the sanctions that are thayer. the u.s. has had map channel -- sanctions on iran since 1978. candice katzman has done a whole volume of the sanctions. so you need to understand is that the president in a sense unilaterally but presidential authority could ways. all right, that gives them more discretion. as distinct from those that would require congressional concurrence and under what terms.

the sanctions are written in different ways in terms of whether the president can do it with an affirmative vote by congress or as long as there's nothing negative vote by the congress. you need to map all of that to figure out how much the president could do, even if he didn't get support and have that in mind. also, some of what iran needs in a deal is the president cantilever. to me except there is a rich man enrichment iran? added declaratory cents, he can do that. but ultimately, to provide -- and also, a lot of what concerns the iranians or european union sanctions. and so, some autonomy fare, although the u.s. congress has written some sanctions for the u.s. will sanction european allies that they are trading with iran. extraterritorial sanctions. which people act out loud about, but it sometimes can be

affected. you have to not that. fundamentally, the president understands that the republicans are never going to applaud anything he would do. the issue is hard how delphi. there's nothing that he would do that they would really support. but are they willing to at least not fight all of it, or how hard would they be willing to fight would be the key issue. and there is one of the ways in which israel comes in as so. because if he reaches an agreement that addresses realistic israeli concerns, in a satisfactory way, then that will change the dynamic and congress not because republicans would be supporting obama or whatever, but because they would be getting out their message is. this is too important. don't mess with it.

so i think that is part of how you sell it. but ultimately, if the deal is big enough as colin said and got enough from the ukrainians, it allows the president to go out and use the bully pulpit which says the alternative overtime was war and the country doesn't want that. he ran his 10 times bigger than syria, et cetera, three times bigger than iraq in terms of population. that was the path we were heading on. i've got the steel, you know, that other governments have supported and the military supporters and so on and so forth. these are the two choices. if the house of representatives does agree to anything, i think you could use the bully pulpit if it's big enough. something incremental, you can. the last thing i personalities. i know the iranian team and it's

great news and challenging news. but zarif, the foreign minister is one of the smartest, funniest people i've ever met and professional life. i mean, he's hilarious, extremely witty and absolutely brilliant. and i don't think he believes it's in iran's interest to have a nuclear weapon personally. he was involved in the 90s and though the confidence of the saudi's and the others. he was the leader in that. where the iranians for improvement regulations. that's what he does. rouhani similarly. but it means there's also a very formidable negotiators because unlike some of their predecessors, they are not ideological. i mean, khomeini appointed some of their predecessors. he may not be smart, but i trust in, whereas these guys are smart is not so sure.

and so, in terms of how it is going to be to deal with them, we are going to really have to be sharp on her game. if you try to choose death that is unfair and unbalanced, they will just be able to spot this around the head rhetorically. it's going to be important to somebody and i say he's got a sense of humor. barbara knows them, too. you are going to feel like an first of all because you're not getting the jokes, you're not laughing. the other people in the room pokémon, that was funny. we need to have somebody with a sense of humor. ibm back >> will have to have another panel on diplomacy and international affairs at some point. before we get to quick lightning round of questions, i'm going to ask for a couple questions that nasa speakers to briefly address them. i want to ask a variation of the previous question to colin about sanctions. i mean, we talked about the need

to assess the sanctions are in place and what the president options are in terms of relaxing the sanctions. some members of congress have been advocating there should be yet another tougher round of sanctions approved by congress. the house passed the bill a couple months ago. the senate might do that. they argue that is the approach that will work. some of them want sanctions that don't allow the president waiver authority. i think i know what your answer is. i want you to explain with some considerations are with that approach in with the problems are and how that makes the deal more difficult. >> i agree mostly with what george said about the challenges at the end. i also think one of the big challenges you alluded to is that congress could use it thinks in the interim to make it harder. it's hard now, really hard now. this only possible in the context of a bigger deal, which is what i said.

in the entrance we could do things to make it even tougher. in particular, they may time certain pension legislation in a very convenient way. if there's no negotiations in september, we get beyond got, there may be serious strikes that will see the senate that in some version, which is basically a de facto trade embargo against iran. how that plays into the disputes between rouhani and the others that will be kicked out of bed syria operation. this is a very complex equation. part could be the timing and nature of the sanctions. the other issues i think are about a lamented the congress history of presidential waiver authority from sanction. that's a it, because it limits the ability of the president to spend the implementation of sanctions for certain periods of time to implement confidence building measure through these approaches, so that ties the president had done that. it also makes it to hold the

coalition together because we been answered third parties is an inducement to encourage them to cooperate in some other areas. last but not least, there've been talk in congress i hope this is receding of not only passing sanctions to sell the loopholes, that to tie them to the nuclear programs in the human rights progress, democracy, minority rights, which are on a lot on a lot of vocals. effectively communicate the most the regime changers, were not going to lift the sanctions. anything put into a major piece of legislation, which also includes requirements to certify that arrested him and rights perspective of the sanctions get listed as a vote for war with iran. i think people in congress are as any to make up to that. if they aren't, i hope they heard what i just said. it's not important to get congress on board at the end. it's to happen because more difficult along the way.

>> that's an important point. we'll take a couple three questions here. one question each quickly and then i'll have each of the speakers try to handle them. >> i am ed amador. i wonder if they could expand on potential roles for the u.n. above and beyond the iaea and the security council if you will action by the u.n. general assembly, actions by the u.s. secretary, given the problems were happy to see her now where we've had a rejection by the administration of u.n. action. >> next hemisphere, thanks. >> would it help in negotiations with iran if we required israel to clarify its nuclear posture and if it turns out they do have nuclear weapons, forcing them to get rid of them? >> behind you, i recognize senior fellow great settlement. yes, great. >> this is a political question for george and colin.

if indeed the supreme leaders commits the ultimate u.s. objective is regime change and of course this is not the supreme leader who thinks this. are we on the wrong track and how the administration is handling area by citing iranian for cw in the past, but not mentioning that the u.s. on that occasion it is the perpetrator of the attack and continuing to insist that there's no role for iran at the table for any geneva to discussions about serious future. >> already. three good or tough questions. why don't we start. >> on the question about the u.n. a possible role for secretary or general assembly, my imagination is to eliminate to see a path to his role in a big problem as the u.s. congress has reaches talked about. i would keep the u.n. as far

away from it as possible. what a help clarify the capability aid that wouldn't happen, if it happened it would be his. there's a reason why israel never declared that it has nuclear weapons and why egypt, for example has never said that it does that talks about a safeguarded fissile material is that all the countries in the region would be under more pressure to acquire nuclear weapons or to resist if israel overtly haida capability are tested it, god for bid. the rain and start insisting that the israeli nuclear capability be part of the negotiation. and so i think we should leave that aside. now if there is a diplomatic resolution to the iranian issue for affair and his bond over this issue, much more attention to resist focused on israel's nuclear capability and that may

be good thing. people say ran maybe just to get rid of what it was worried about. now why doesn't israel number one? or number two, you just went to iran, but what about israel? this could happen later. in terms of a diplomatic solution, it's basically unrelated and should be left unrelated and lastly on syria, i think what the administration is trying to do so by and was rouhani is trying to do so far is not that was going on was very active in the way of what they want to pursue on the nuclear channel and bilaterally. i think obama has been very cautious in this fight and the iranians have been very cautious in this way. we are never going to korea and syria. we're always going to be on the opposite side because iranian have a profoundly different

entries than we do. so that when seems to me to be manageable and both sides seem to me to be doing a pretty good job of trying to kind of walk and chew gum at the same time. >> i'm not going to comment on the israel issue. i think george covered the above. expanding the current talks to include more u.n. involvement is not a good idea. the p5+1 is plenty big and unwieldy. in fact, the key is not to make it bigger, but to make it smaller. that is is a stained bilateral between united states and iran and the only way to do it done. p5+1 can endorse and modify it, but it will make it down in a quiet room with senior american officials. on the syria issues, greg, the moderates have reasons to cut a deal on the nuclear issue and resolve some of the pressure completely separate from syria and trying to downplay syria and

miscalculations. if the americans strike and its relatively limited in duration and scope what make it easier for them. that will make it much harder for them and their competition with higher gc folks who want to play a spoiler role. i totally agree that i think there's some value in terms of the discourse of the obama it in this ration to say something about the u.s. experience of the 1980s in the context of the iran-iraq war. the personal do something along the following lines to be in somebody's speech, kerry, obama, somebody and say something that we were wrong to look the other way when saddam is poisonous gas against his own people and against iran. and aside allies are brought today to look the other way when he does the same thing to his people. we went up to our mistakes in the pot like the most about food. we are strong enough to survive that. and it would help rouhani and

rafsanjani to look the other way. i think it helps them make their case and removes the argument from their opponents that we are hypocrites. that's what i would be advocating. adults will happen or not. last but not least, i hope and i suspect the administration is thinking about day after planning first area, not in terms of how to use the strike to galvanize diplomacy and syria, but minimize collateral damage for the strike of the rand diplomatic track that leverages the strike to have some conversations with the iranians, which might pull them into a bilateral discourse on a whole host of issues. i don't know that's happening. i hope they are thinking about it. if they are, they should. >> on the u.n. involvement, i see two potential roles. certainly on the u.n. security council should strengthen the sanctions. i talked about illicit goods. more needs to be done to make it

harder to buy a good for its nuclear program in iran will go up freely in diabetes rings, let's say for example brazil can do are far from that day. the role of the u.n. versus the sanctions committee to better implement the sanctions and also to have good better band to iran would be very useful. the deals that we are discussed in the 2003 to 2006, they at least are to deal with the israeli question. any p5+1 deal should have been the u.n. passing them endorsing resolution that there needs to be a broader discussion about arms control.

>> grizzard's agreement to have a conference on the sofa or weapons. are we going to repeat that? >> it was done in the context of the resolution to the iraq war and that led to a whole series of actions that were very positive and not distract their best nuclear weapons free zone today. so we think there's ways to do it that could encourage this kind of discussion that does create this conflict that can't be resolved. >> already. i want to thank everybody. we are not time today. i think it's been a very important discussion. as i think everybody was saying, the iranian program is at dancing, but there's still time for diplomacy, but that diplomacy is going to have to be much more sophisticated, creative, energetic, even as the problems of the middle east proliferates. so i want to thank george

berkowitz, colin call. more information on the website as more of the new briefing book on iranian nuclear puzzle. thank you. [applause] >> president obama announced today he would address the nation onto way up the case for taking military action in the area. this comes ahead of any votes next week in congress on whether to authorize military force. majority leader harry reid during a brief senate session. they will proceed to the resolution on a day when members