as i have visited with members of our appropriations committees i have been impressed with how well the members are able to grab on to and connect to what we do in ways that are important to them. this question about democracy, history political fundamentals resonates with virtually everybody. there are many who are interested in what we do. we're talking a lot about what we do. these grants are so

important because they touch local communities. every one of them is about a local community in some way. we have to keep making that pitch. we also need to make this argument about the public relevance and how not only how much poorer we would be without them and the work that we do but how incapacitated we would become if we did not have these entities doing what they do. >> with only two years left of the obama administration how do you approach priorities to get as much done as you can? >> i was just talking about this with a few people this morning. i think we have to think

about the most important things 1st of all. and sort them out. things that would be reasonably pursued in his timetable. there is a way that i and my administration might have a longer life than that. we do understand there is this big moment coming. the scope of the work that we agree to take on we don't want to take on things that could not reasonably be done for eight years. that is too far. trying as best as we can to sort this out and be

prudent. >> some questioners have a concern about the election next year. would you be open to staying on to serve in the next administration regardless of the political party of the next president? [laughter] >> i think so. you know i am not a deeply experienced person in washington. we are independent agencies. that is to say, the work that we do is not carry out or execute and any simple sense and administrations policy and most of the ways we understand it's because we get grants and are getting grants according to the excellence and impressiveness and

persuasiveness of the grantees and i can't imagine a situation in which in the new administration from a different party that work can be done by me and my colleagues in a way that has integrity and a meeting. so it is conceivable that that could happen but i don't know. we will see. >> thank you for at least responding. this is the pen ultimate question before we have what is known traditionally as the last question. 2015 marks the marks the beginning of the 50th anniversary commemorations of the vietnam war. he served in that war. do you see a lasting effect of that war on our nation's collective sense of its own

identity? >> while. that is a humanities question, if i ever heard one. yes, in some ways i i do. i mention this amazing legislative agenda that the johnson administration had. what was so impressive to me is that it was achieved in circumstances that were extraordinarily difficult. there were a lot of people who remember how tough those times were and that all of this happened in the midst of the circumstances is really quite amazing. i think their are ways in which that turbulence is deeply affected me and others of my generation. and so in many ways that are cultural and political i i

think we are a very different place because of the. however at the same time we find ourselves coming out of 15 years, more than 15 years of almost continuous conflict in circumstances and in political frameworks that are not usually different. we're still talking about counterinsurgency. and so it is one of the reasons i am so interested in the question about the legacy of war how we as a people think about what we have been through and keeping the memory of what we have been through a live. that is difficult, a

difficult thing to do but it is important that it be done. when we go into these situations we are not thinking about what life is like when we come out of them. now that we are coming out of them we are confronted with very complicated questions about veterans, their lives, how they get reengaged in civilian life and those kind of questions need to be on our mind at the beginning as well as the end. >> we are almost out of time but before asking the last questions we have a couple of housekeeping matters to take care of. i i would like to remind you about our upcoming luncheon. chairman of chairman of the federal energy regulatory commission will speak about the challenges her agency faces to maintain the reliability of the nation's electricity grid. nextel would like to present

our guest with a traditional national press club mode. the last question, on a lighter note you were known to take in to the stage where you served as president of colby college literally. you both appeared on stage in a a musical. do you have a special love for broadway musicals? [laughter] >> i know as to whether we will appear on washington on stage my wife is something very much not. she humored me. she was a musical theater actor for much of her early professional life and has a wonderful talent and voice. she put up with me. there were others in the

jazz concert before we left. we did the great song fever. [laughter] would you like to come up and do it now? [laughter] but in any case my love for musical theater came from her. one of my heroes now. it has been a great part of our time together and is a gift that was given to me by my wife. thank you. [applause] >> thank you. thank you, chairman adams. i have to say, thank you you all for coming today. we are adjourned. >> next a briefing on air force operations.

then then trade experts discuss changes to us relations with cuba. after that income inequality. pres. obama gives his state of the union address before a joint session of congress on tuesday. his speech and the republican response plus reaction from you and members of congress. we start the night off with a look at the history of the state of the union speech. live coverage. later at 11:00 p.m. another chance to see the president's speech. republicans have newly elected iowa senator johnny urged to give the parties formal response. elected in november and the 1st woman to represent iowa and congress. tuesday starting at 8:00 p.m.

>> here are some of our featured programs for this weekend.

>> the obama administration has approved the 12 types of travel to cuba.

>> thank you. hello, everyone. thank you for joining. since becoming the sec. of the air force we have dealt with many issues that are enormously critical to national security. first, the united states air force remains fully engaged in combat operations. to date we have provided more than 60 percent of the 16,000 plus. we also continue at the same time our enduring efforts to provide air and space superiority, intelligence, surveillance reconnaissance rapid global mobility nuclear forces and command-and-control.

these of course, are our five core missions. we have never wavered, even even with this operation ongoing in the middle east with our sizable and long-standing commitment in europe and throughout the pacific and certainly will not in the future. additionally we have been navigating through some challenging issues that are facing us as an institution including shortfalls in nuclear enterprise tackling sexual assaults and the tough decisions involving the downsizing. in order to increase our perspective the chief and i have i have made a commitment to routinely get outside the beltway and ensure we are getting first-hand feedback and looks at the missions being performed by our airmen. so we have been on the road again bit this past year.

we are staying connected with sister services combatant commanders congress, industry, allies and international partners who we meet with routinely. and so the bottom line if i step back everyone wants wants more air force. indeed, we have never been busier. demand for our services is up but we are meeting those demands with the smallest air force in our history. when you couple that smaller force against the backdrop of an austere budget and the huge demand what we have is a total force under significant strain. i mean our active duty national guard, reserved, civilians, and families. indeed. indeed, general welsh and i saw this strain first-hand.

fortunately we have dedicated and professional people who have been getting the job done. let me now briefly talk about the fy 15 budget as well as a bit of an outlook for fy 16 and beyond. then we would be happy to take your questions. for those of you who were with us in our last update in july you will remember that we made a call issued a call to congress which basically was that obviously we understand the constitutional prerogative of congress to rearrange our funding priorities but in so doing please do not detrimental readiness, make choices which end up with readiness as the bill payer. while we cannot accomplish her duties without congressional support

command in that spirit i want to step back and thank the congress for supporting our air force readiness and modernization going forward. the congress appropriated the overwhelming majority of the air force portion of the defense appropriation budget request for fy 15. we ended up with a higher top line than our original request, which i think is recognition of just how necessary and valuable our forces. with that said we did not agree on everything. congress restricted tough choices. but they did give us the funding that we needed to sustain the operations and to operate your current force structure levels for this year. most importantly they did not pay. for this we are grateful. speaking of force structure our travel shows us that

when it comes to the downsizing we have undergoing, enough is enough indeed,. indeed, that is the number one source of strength for our airmen. we agree that we have now downsized as much as we can and support of trying to balance resources and capabilities. indeed, we have announced there shall be no involuntary force in 2015. we are working toward an fy 15 goal 15 goal of maintaining strength, around 350,000 which is where we intend to remain. if anything we need to look about going out this goes to the guard and reserve. turning to the future the air force will face challenges as we continue to restore readiness, modernizer force and take

care of our airmen with a focus on ending sexual assault. sexual assault response coordinators with whom i meet regularly tell me that i -- we are making progress in this fight. the information contained bears this out, but it is not good enough. this past monday i kicked off our sexual assault prevention summit where we brought together over 150 airmen of different ranks and backgrounds to have discussions and workshops and particularly focus on prevention, but one of the many ongoing efforts designed to demonstrate that we will give this persistent focus persistent and persistent action going forward.

turning to fy 16 we we will be asking the congress to eliminate sequestration as well as to allow us to get rid of excess base infrastructure, and once again ask for the authority to divest older aircraft in order to free up money plowed back into people readiness, and modernization. keeping in mind. keeping in mind as we have said, if sequestration does return it we will have serious and devastating effects on some parts of the air force. we will ask congress to resource manpower requirements to meet needs, to support the combatant commanders. gen. welsh has coordinated very closely with our combatant commanders as we assembled the budget and we are committed to meeting their most pressing needs. we cannot share too much today but after the budget is submitted we we will have more to say about our key investments in the nuclear

enterprise, cyber, space national guard and air force is and intelligence, intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance. i do have a few announcements. last june i visited an air force base and saw our remotely piloted aircraft first-hand. the airmen who performed this essential mission do a phenomenal job but talks with the pilots and the center operators and their leaders certainly suggested to me that this is a force under significant stress significant stress from what is an unrelenting pace of operations. these pilots fly six days in a row working 13 14 hour

days on average. to give you a contrast, an average pilot flies between 200 20300 hours per year. again, these are averages. the pilots lost four times that much ranging from 900 to 1100 flight hours per year. again, this is stressful because mistakes can cost lives. finally, i learned many of our experienced operators are nearing the end of there active-duty service commitment which means they we will have a choice in the not-too-distant future to either stay with us or leave the air force. to force. to start working on these problems and remedy some of these issues i want to share with you some of the steps we are taking now to address. immediately relieve some some of the strain while still meeting the command -- combatant

commander requirements and recognize we we will have more work to do for the longer term to address the people side. here are the near-term steps. steps. we will maximize the use of the national guard and reserve and redirect resources in order to provide money to bring additional personnel on active duty. we will seek recently qualified active-duty rpa pilot volunteers to deploy for six months to some of these distressed units. these are folks who have been rpa pilots but have gone back into their original airframes. we will seek volunteers. number three we we will delay the return of some of the rpa pilots who are on loan to the rpa world from other

friends. those three items we are acting on now and believe we will provide near-term relief to the up-tempo and boost the quality of life. we are also looking at pay. previously policy did not allow us to offer retention bonuses to pilots are only qualified to fly unmanned platforms. to get this changed. i will be utilizing my authority to compensate and incentivize career only rpa pilots who service obligations are expiring. as operators. the end of their initial commitment we we will increase the monthly incentive pay from 650 per month to $1,500.

our combatant commanders expect and demand the unique isr capabilities that only the air force can provide. they have delivered time critical data prosecuted targets and supported combatant commanders without fail. fail. it is critical we address these now and will have more to say as we finalize details in the next few months. this is the greatest air force anywhere in the world and is so primarily because of our airmen. the american people expect our air force will be able to fly, fight, and when and when against any adversary and combatant commanders expect the same.

so again, thank you for joining us today and now we we will take your questions. [inaudible question] >> no i do not. the current war against kayfive, their are a number of of platforms engaged. they are each contributing. i believe the statistic is 11% from the a-10 community. my.is,.is, it is a great contributor, but so are the other aircraft. even had we planned to retire even if that have

been agreed to the wood have still have them in our inventory. >> and emotional issue. >> well, it is an emotional issue inside the air force. i would be disappointed if they were not emotional about this. they love there airplane. they should. for the air force it is a sequestration driven decision. we do not have enough money to fund all of the things that we currently have. the good news is last year we were funded to continue operating. it has been intended to be around until 2019 and our

intent is to use that great platform anyway we can. it it is not about not liking or wanting. it is about tough decisions to recapitalize and air force. >> can i ask you you have spoken a lot about rpa. the combat lessons being learned airstrikes in yemen, just operationally people seem to think airstrikes are the thing that solves the problem. what are the limitations you are seeing from the use of drones and airstrikes more broadly in terms of limitations on what they can and cannot do? >> in general terms our rpa fleet is predominantly used

for isr not strike activity we have the capability to conduct strikes from some platforms, and we have taken advantage of that but it is not the primary use. limitations of using an rpa to conduct a a strike or similar to limitations of using an aircraft. you have to identify a target, clearly the conflict friend from flow, minimize civilian collateral damage. some of the limitation is you are trying to develop situational awareness as opposed to having a pilot over the battlefield looking and using a human brain sensor, which is pretty good ideally you would have both tools available. having

people on the ground assist because it helps you.at the highest priority targets helps you do conflict friend from foe easier. all of those factors apply everywhere. >> do you think there is too much emphasis at the moment on the air part of the equation? defeat may not be what is possible. >> i do not think speaking specifically the dod approach is not to defeat isis from the air. the emphasis is to give the ground force time to retrain you do not dictate into states from the air am to my controlled territory influence people, maintain lines of control. that will take a ground

force being trained to try to make that effort. >> yes. amy butler. first with regard to the irc last year there was some discussion about when it would happen in part because of the maintainer issue. i am curious if you can give us your current thinking on when it is likely to be able to declare and if you are looking at changing the parameters. secondly bigger picture with the joint strike fighter whatever you do, whether it is 2016 or 17 or whatever, they are not coming in at the rate you want. this will not become holy influential. there is a lot of talk that

it we will be at a risk a risk of compromise because the proliferation of high-frequency radars. if you're looking at how to address that issue. >> you want to -- 1st of all, i believe it we will be as scheduled between artist and august and december of 2016 and have seen nothing that changes my opinion of that. it is initial operational capability and means we we will have the capability to employ a number of aircraft to conduct operational activity. foc is the key when the airplane should be fully capable of doing the things we put in our requirement. our development of capabilities that are not available as far as i know at least recently.

you get the airplane have initial capability continue to upgrade. by the time you declare it fully operational capable that means it meets the requirements you defined. that is where you focus. in fact i am comfortable. none of the things coming out as far as concerns about software development are surprises. the program has tracked along a milestone set. i won't talk about before that but since then it has tracked consistently. we must continue to do that. the big challenges operationalizing maintenance and making sure the system is capable of supporting

deployments. i feel good about that but the focus is capability, fully capable. stealth is an interesting discussion because people tend to identify a piece a piece of it and think someone we will compromise that piece. the reality is it is a combination of things. speed observability, collecting data, collecting data, transmitting and protecting transmissions way of breaking killed chains. while he may have a new radar developed that allows an acquisition radar to cnn plane that does not mean it can pass the track off to a greater level data weapon and break the chain. you are successfully using stealth, and i don't see anything that indicates that is not going to be true ten years from now. >> just to clarify, the

issue actually could be a showstopper. you don't think -- >> the development of the aircraft. the maintainer issue is not an f 35 problem. >> but it is critical for ioc declaration. >> you have to have enough to operate your initial detachment, but we we will. >> we have enough people to prioritize this to the.where we we will be able to get to ioc. have some help from the congress today. >> i was wondering if you could speak to clarify, you we will attempt to retire aircraft. secondly, talk generally

about how the operation has impacted the budget request? >> i would answer that question by saying we are constantly monitoring what is going on in the world constantly making adjustments as a result. it is safe to say the budget submission overflight some of those changes. in terms of the retiring of the older aircraft i doubt it we will be identical but their will be similarities. >> very interested in new pay. is this for all pilots or just those nearing the end of their active service commitments? >> as you no right now, they get the same flight pay as a pilot a pilot in any other airplane. the difference is right now

when pilots of manned aircraft are often aviator simulation pay which tries to keep them in the service. that is not available to rpa pilots. so what the secretary has done is done the approval to plus of that flight play to 1500 per month as an interop stop. the next is to pursue aviation simulation pay similar to what manned aircraft pilot gets. >> for all rpa pilots? >> rpa pilots that were currently operating. but the proposal for continuation pay we will be broader. >> effective this month. >> i'm not sure. but let us get back to you right after this on that. people double check. >> one way which i don't

think has been explored is allowing and commissioned officers to fly them. is that something appear force is interested in looking at? >> we are looking at two things. yes, things. yes, we should look at the enlisted force as a potential. there are pluses and minuses. we're looking at those now. the 2nd step is to look at other services might be divesting themselves of aviation assets and see if there's interest in the cruise for those assets. >> one last one. you have delayed the return of pilots on loan elsewhere. i was not quite sure what you meant by that.

>> that. >> pilots have been trained and specialize in another airplane may spend some portion of their career in the rpa field but then the idea is to go back to the original airframe. we would delay that. >> how long? >> right now specifics about 38 people who are on offer tours. they're scheduled to go back this summer. of those we are talking to each one of them and asking him about staying. we know their are five have been matched for other jobs and will leave. the other 33, we we will ask if they would consider staying. our crew force out there we will tell you that they enjoy the mission, like the work, are excited about the future but are just worn out this is not a knew problem. as a requirement keeps increasing solutions keep

wagging. the biggest problem is training. we can only train about 180 per year and we are losing about 240 from the community. training 180 and losing 240 is not a winning proposition, losing 240 is not a winning proposition and the reason is because they are only 63 percent manned. we can't we can't release the people from operational units. half of them are flying operational support missions. >> has the pressure the strain on the pilot led to a decline in the number of's

you secam put out at any one time or a hope for growth that you had? the operational effect on these individual pilots. had to reduce the combatant commanders. >> no, we have not. putting people in a position where they have to debate whether they want to continue doing this. >> just a follow a follow up quickly, do you think these initial steps that you have outlined here is this a 1st step forward you need something more from congress in order to build up the number of pilots needed? >> these are 1st steps. within the next few months we we will have a more robust plan but these are the immediate actions.

investing in innovation. specifically with the air force expects him the saying that the system is the one to invest in. >> if you are a service founded from technology and to be successful you are required to stay on the leading edge of technology over time anything that drives innovation within the department of defense which will likely benefit science technology research development is good for us.

us. we are under the secretary's guidance now putting together a new strategic master plan that includes an annex that is purely science and technology ideas for the future. that will tie closely into this effort and we think we have a a number of ideas that will feed into this effort which may assist us in moving faster or may give the department ideas for how they can move forward with other services. i think some of the standard ones are things like hypersonic technology, how you would use it, how you wouldn't the advanced engine technology demonstrator is a great example of a place where we could not only get better performance the same as much as 25 percent of fuel cost. we need to get that feel good. that is a game changer. there are great applications

quantum computing springs to mind. training, how you interest people, how you teach people as we go forward. the possibilities are just endless. >> the navy something similar to that. >> there a lot of efforts we could use. you should be looking at laser defense from exporting ways to five laser communications. there are a number of ways we should be moving forward. this is exciting. >> yes sir, 2nd row. >> secretary, why should a new entrant believes the air force is performing in good

faith with its stunning six months away in certification >> i think we were all disappointed that it was not certified. we had high hopes. however they have come along way. 80 percent of the criteria are met with 20 percent still to go. this is real engineering work that needs to be demonstrated. so i hope they no that we are operating in good faith. the certifying official personally put a great deal of time and attention on this resources, people money to try to make sure we were doing everything that we needed to do to get this over the finish line. this is not a question of if they we will be certified

but when. as you.out, it is it is still some months away but i am certain it we will be their. the last.i will make is that the certification process is written down, contained in a proprietary document and it was signed by those parties, by the air force, by space ask. this lays out in detail what needs to happen. so it is important that all parties reread that document and understand what needs to happen. i am sure that final 20 percent will be done expeditiously. we will get there. >> we will you publicly release it? >> it is proprietary, so we we will not. >> a redacted version. >> i had not considered that. we will look into it him.

>> i want to your reaction to elon musk's statements to bloomberg business. he says the people fighting the certification are in the bureaucracy of the pentagon and the procurement officers who then go and work for boeing and lockheed. easy to understand this. essentially being asked to award a contract to a company where they probably won't get a job against the company whether friends are. this is a difficult thing to expect. kind of a slap a slap at the integrity of your acquisitions program. your reaction? >> i think those are rather unfortunate comments. i i do not no who he means her family is referring to but the people that i know i

working very hard on the certification. and so i think those are unfortunate remarks, and i do not agree with them. the last.i would like to make is that after all is said and done i am going to set up an independent review which we will be led by the former chief of staff who you may recall very recently did an excellent job doing an independent review of our nuclear enterprise. so enterprise. so he has agreed that he we will take this one on. we are finalizing the details of what the work plan we will look like. i am one that thinks that any process which we have now been operating under for about a year and a half what have we learned? other ways we can streamline, speeded up, do things differently. things differently but still protecting what we call mission assurance which

means we want these satellites launched without failures the process and procedure and what we now call the certification process was born. we do not want to sacrifice, but their can be lessons learned and i want to make sure we have and implement if it looks appropriate to do so. >> he said in a fairly deliberative manner, will you communicate your displeasure directly? by your acquisition professional and say the hell with him? >> it will not ripple through. i feel very confident about. i only wish that he would have said some of this to me directly when i called him to tell him that it had not quite made it.

>> going back to renewing the push to retire we will be different this time around explain a little bit better to justify these cuts the question on a separate issue. a lot of changes. continue strategy. >> in terms of what we will change, it's probably not a magic bullet answer him and we have to why continue to explain the tradition about why we need to invest. if we had a lot more money coming a lot more money we

could do it all, but all but we're not going to have a lot more money so we have to make choices that which is what we are paid to do. so we will explain the story to the members who we have known for some time as well as to the new ones. >> the infrastructure consolidations in europe are just that, consolidations. it is not giving up mission capability. there was an opportunity to save money over time by consolidating installations. and getting rid of three vases and consolidating one. they have the common infrastructure required to continue activity. it is much more efficient overtime. mildenhall is a base closure

excessive compared to the combat capability that we get from the operations on the base command we have other installations or that can be that it down. we can save the recapitalization cost of rebuilding the infrastructure. our partners in the uk have done a lot of downsizing and soul-searching on how they will operate for the last ten years and we are supportive although neither one of us really like giving things like this up. [inaudible question] >> for structure. playing into what used to be expeditionary wings.

>> part of an ongoing effort to normalize the air force presence in that region, career, uk, etc., uk, etc., expanding of the company tours, things like that do you expect it to continue at other locations? >> we will we are trying to do is support us central command desire in any way that we can away that makes sense that we can afford. when they decide on this long-term footprint we supported. if they would like to

establish a more permanent presence over time and work that agreement with the department of defense policy folks, state folks, state department, then we figure out how to help them as the keepers of the installations and facilities whether it is new air operations center are trying to expand family presence seven we can build stronger relationships. we relationships. we try to meet their requirements just like we try to meet their operational requirement. we are we are drawing down the number of operations in the greater middle east. and it we will be necessary to identify which we will be semipermanent to permanent. centcom's responsibility is to lead that effort, and our job is to try to make those facilities capable and credible. >> mdm. sec., madam secretary, going back to the question about force structure reduction

since the congress told you we really don't like the idea of the second-tier of items and also are you going to submit a budget that has two levels of numbers. >> i would suspect 1st of all that the president's budget proposal will be revealed in february. i'm february. i'm sorry that we cannot go into more detail about that specifics but i suspect that it we will be above the sequestration level. i suspect we will be asking for a level which is much closer than we think we need as opposed to what we might be forced to live under. that is my best guess at the moment. assuming i am right we

would also, of course, just like we did last year explain to the congress that if we had to go to sequestration here would be the choices. again, if the choices were considered tough, and we certainly thought they were and we certainly thought they were, sequestration will be much, much more severe. we say again that we will we will be bad for everyone and we need to lift sequestration. >> not specifically a 2nd tier budget for sequestration but a list of probable alternatives. >> that is what i suspect we we will do, yes. >> a follow-up from a question earlier. a lot of urgency and concern it sounds like you are saying that their will be enough. is there more happening?

>> this is a a difficult problem to figure out. what we have been doing in the last month or so two months i guess since the final decisions were issued by the congress even trying to work our way through it. we think we are getting close to a solution which is anything but perfect. if presumably what leverage a little bit of a flexibility that we were allowed in congress but it would leverage a number of different factors to try to bring us together so as not to risk the ioc but as you.out, they are not enough of the experienced maintenance people to go around which is why this is so difficult. >> if the proposals we come forward with are not agreed to than ioc is at risk. we are now to the 2nd set of solutions beyond what we thought was the best military approach because we

have not been allowed to take that. we don't have 1000 extra maintenance people waiting for a job. they are doing other work. we have to take them out of something else. it is the only way to develop them, or hire contractors or do ioc. we don't like the option of delaying ioc. we will do everything that we can several that we will be painful and different ways to try not to do that. >> when will those solutions start to be implemented back is it already happening? >> this is something we have been working on with folks on the hill for a while to try to get a solution to get this done. as the budget rolls out and we get into the discussion of the budget and the timeline it we will become clear. >> the rocket engine development program providing extra 220 million for that.

use that to speed up processes. >> so we are trying to work through those details right now. him. >> we don't have all those details flushed out yet. >> foreign policy. the department announced decisions to cut ten predator and repair combat air patrols and i was curious if the demand out of centcom and the islamic state has forced the defense department to reconsider that decision and how that will exacerbate some of these challenges you are talking about? ..

>> >> to keep the people is a the career field. it is not a big number at all in the cost associated expanding its support from the guarded reserved to expand their manpower to bring people full-time to support more activity. that is what we have in our budget already but there is cost associated and over time it is part of the appropriation request. in the future it has to be part of appropriation. the sunday in the training pipeline is in the budget.

i just don't know the amount that can get that for you. >> the solutions that you announce today's seed to be focused on the pilots that the broader mission kirk if what potential solutions are you looking at to ease the stress of that force? id the damage by further cuts personnel lies are we talking about to see operation already disaffected? >> qb rob? >> we have been working retention and issues for a while now. there have been a number of initiatives we can give you a list over time but the crisis right now with the

pilot force because of the way the two hours of service are organized we're reaching a point where some of them can go. that is why that is the focus but as far as future discussions it is about the entire enterprise and has been the last eight years. we are considering everybody the specific items are to keep the pilot force is a gauge. and nt as you know, greengage in this enterprise. so 315,000. we cannot go any lower. it is too small to succeed rather than too big to fail.

we have taken people out to shore up those areas. we have grown from 21 caps from 55 + and then they come out of other things where we change the ratio of the fly. now we have to go back to get the of the bids above 85% because that is affecting capability get sports systole band and the intelligence forces up to full banding. then is why we think even moving hardware out of the airforce the software bring new people with that reserve component a and remand the air force squadrons. we can cut things out all we want but if we break squadron reroute of business

>>, its duty to get the security fully manned? order the things we will be doing next year to process? i know capability was one of the key investments what we do to keep that moving forward and what percentage of of budget will invest in a nuclear? >> we have read directed 11p repeople 2 + up the forces plus critical specialties we will make sure those are wedded to present and. -- when did% covered. and we were passionate not to go any lower and one of the things i have discovered is we are under may and in

lots of areas of the airforce but we will not with the eight critical nuclear is. so we will continually monitoring tests to critique and change. / will track that plant bright -- separately we cannot share the specifics of the of money at this point but it is an area of additional investment next year as well as the five-year plan which that will all be public in february. >> i with bloomberg. do have an update with a new form of program?

is there any addition to the timeline? teeeight you speak to the urgency of it and if it is why is it better to spend this time and money for more aircraft? >> competition there is nothing new and it is on track. the best guess projection is sometime in the late spring or early summer. no real changes to the programs. steady as she goes. do you want to talk about the operation apart? >> the b-2 is young but compared to other aircraft better able to operate 20 years from now it is sold. the timeline of the bomber allows us to start the tiring the b-52 flight --

feet over a 15 year period so we will still have b-2s in the inventory about the same we have now and hopefully by the mid 20's 40's 80 or 100 is the target number we have stuck with that for a specific reason and we believe that is what it takes to have significant analysis to do nuclear deterrence and a large scale campaign. you need that number of bombers. it is of mathematical equation so we try very hard to keep prices in independent variables. in staying on a delivered track and the acquisition timeline is really important to us. that is the approach and right now we're comfortable where we need to be. >> thank you very much.

>> i wrote these books come in the reason i thought it was important to collect these histories is that wheeling transformed into an industrial city the latter part of the 19th century and early part of the 20th century and it isn't common in west virginia that it has in the grants for various parts of europe here in search of jobs and

opportunity. so i thought it was important to record their story but most people tend to focus on the frontier history but of equal importance of the industrial period. >> that river was the western experience of the united states in 1770. of the first project funded by the federal government from their land to wheeling

virginia. when it comes here, that will give this community about that time was 50 years old, the spurt that it needs for growth. over the next 2425 years the population will almost triple. [inaudible conversations] good morning everybody.

thank you for braving the of weather today we were a little worried the federal government may have the delay or clochard the coz when there is a half an inch of snow in washington anything can happen. john came from buffalo this morning where they have passed an inch of snow that is like spring. [laughter] i am the executive director and we are here to -- delighted to have you here i like to think our team is managing director and all the insurance for all their help to put on this event and other events. we have of big announcement we made yesterday which was the launch of a new block of america's trade policy.com that was created in 2013

from the woodrow wilson center for scholars and we took over the management of the block and it is a new content platform that we welcome input from members of the trade committee for the information back outside the room when you leave today. we are really pleased on the economic normalization with cuba they publish the first chapter on the blogging and you to find that on the web site as well. to other quickie beds posting a panel talking about the 2015 world congress report with women flourish weekend encounter.

as well as the food program. on friday february 13th we will have our annual trade council program from the ways and means and finance committee that is friday february 13. now today i will leave it to john veroneau to introduce our panel. a long time friend and onetime board member. and co-chair the international trade practice he worked in the department of defense in the '90s with then secretary:and senator collins and senator frist if i have that right. thanks for doing this. take it away.

>> they explored the year and i will introduce the panel here in a moment but i want to open with a few remarks. the title is the falling of u.s. cuba relations and wonder how much of the ideas heard the word thought i'd never thought it would be a good place to be. [laughter] but we're glad you are here. but it is consistent with the other cuba related events but over the years cuba has captures the imagination i remember back when we were trying to get support for the west colombia free trade agreement that enjoys a lot of support from clocks on this panel with columbia represented the generating interest now in that was

limited compared to cuba which seems to capture the imagination and. is not on the politics of the u.s. cuba relations we don't have time to go through the long history but it is an emotional issue. there are families to have the property confiscated whose families were attended and have strong views with the current government in cuba but today we will focus on the president's announcement and what the perspectives are from the legal and business community i want to mention in that category of great timing six months ago to come out with a steady called economic

normalization and with cuba for u.s. policymakers. similar to that focus is not a polemic it was a workman approach in the peterson is a cheery generally that these are the things that policymakers need to think about the end tectonic plates move and it is the serious discussion about normalization and i would commend it on the web site of america trade policy.com in the first chapter is online but it is a very thoughtful piece in what i appreciate is that the

campeau usually fall into the free trade or the protectionist with the work product case said the implicit message is open the market with another country is the good thing that we should approach it with caution in in a measured way and the analogy is russia and with all due respect that is the economy that is not is open as a lot of us hoped it would be at this point of time and when we talk about opening markets with other countries those of us in the free trade camp

think will these be open to us to have the oligarchic system in russia that it discusses says something to avoid so we don't lose the leverage of the u.s. market without having some strategy to be sure it will be open and not sliced up the way was seen in russia. and to conclude that this is not because such an income -- outcome is in the bad interest of companies but the cuban people themselves because economic freedom is the source of there long-term welfare.

with that we will turn over to our panel. i will introduce them in the order we are seats it but then i will mixup. to my immediate left is a vice president of corporate affairs at cargill. she has been in that position since 2004 and before that was of a colleague of mine where she handled agricultural issues it is also the president of the agriculture coalition in in cuba and is active in this space. to her left is jake colvin from the foreign trade council. in addition to being active in many trade issues he has

been particularly active in cuba to publish of paper a road map for the obama administration to reach cuba. and to his left is robert muse who is a lawyer in washington and has represented many clients and has a long history that has testified before congress to have an active participant in policy lies with regard to cuba and to his left is john kavulich senior policy advisor for the u.s. cuba trade and economic council for a place served as his president in making it an from buffalo today has been very active for three decades now on policy matters and we welcome him

and others on the panel today. each will provide remarks 45 through seven minutes then we will have time for questions. we will start with robert who will do this scene setter on december 17th to folks in this room are savvy enough to know the president did not announce the end of the embargo most picked up the newspapers on december december 18 but it is more complicated that robert will lay out for us. >> faq. in the thank you for coming.

the title of this event is the falling of u.s. cuba relations it what does that mean for trade? the short answer is it means as much as obama or any successor wants it to be. the executive branch authority by the nature of the announcement december 17 for a license to trade with cuba, of bilateral removing all export controls on those that want to export to cuba, he has already done it on december 70 the rules are drafted as we speak in terms of imports to about $400 worth of goods to come to the u.s.. he can do that notwithstanding that

prohibit imports of products though the executive branch authority of course, being drafted into a final rule allows imports from cuba. exports is the least five different areas glen is used in residential construction and consumer goods are not defined yet to be used by q been entreprenuers that basically means goods that could be sold in cuba in john could remind me there is to those of u.s. trademarks and goods can now be sold in cuba. he also allowed for farm equipment to be sold to small farms in cuba for gore

at the same time he licensed certain television sales and financial services with the use of credit cards. my essentials point is the announcement of december 17 summarizes and confirms what i and others have been arguing for years the presidential authority in relation to trade with cuba is unfettered. you will hear some comments with the act of 1996 codified the embargo is therefore limited presidential discretion in this area. it is not true. win the embargo was codified it was in place with presidential discretion and authority exercise december

december 17th for i have written extensively on this at various times is there is an article in the fall edition of america is quarterly that sets up the legal basis for what i just said. i want to leave as much time as possible for questions so i will end by saying from what have described the residential sales of materials, take that as a model for u.s. business. at the moment there are agricultural sales one of the few areas that it is allowed. cuba insists they are by instrumentality i suspect that will be true with u.s.

exports to cuba initially whether building materials or farm equipment or consumer goods. but i can see over time that will expand so the trade with cuba should think early on about warehousing and distribution:facilities in cuba and it is recently renovated on the north coast think of the opportunities of expanding the small opening into corporate access into cuba. i believe president obama means it to be a legacy issued in they will go tentatively in april. i don't think she is going to unless there is a larger initiative under way at this point so obama once of

legacy issue in the foreign policy issue so i expect to see a substantial expansion and broadening of the small opening with u.s. corporate sector the first real opportunity since the embargo was imposed 55 years ago. thank you. >> it is great to see you here this morning for about as interesting and we had to expand the room because of the interest. . .

and before i go any further i would like to give you the hashtag hashtag pound cuba at a trade if you are at all interested in reporting out. but the usa cc many people in fact i was speaking with jake a few minutes before and he said wow you pull that together in two days and it was amazing. actually the u.s. agency has been working for eight months to get ourselves organized around

the charter and i will go through exactly what it is that we have committed to as a group. though why eight months ago? we is in a growth of one of the trips that i took to cuba last march basically on a sales call we have been able to sell through humanitarian channels since the year 2000. our first sale or a company with a march 2002 but i was on a sales call and recognize how difficult it was to actually sell food to cuba. fast-forward to me our cfo and i traveled with the delegation with a u.s. chamber of commerce to cuba led by tom donohue to assess the business climate. the cuban government has implemented a new foreign investment law that many folks may or may not know about and at the same time has put laws in place to begin allowing for people, individual people to

become part of the private sector. the cuban government is transitioning many individuals off of the government payroll and recognizing the need to empower the president. while we were there we met with most branches of the cuban government. they were able to visit cooperatives. we were able to meet with entrepreneurs and the first americans to visit the port that has been funded by the brazilians for $800 million. we visited a committee investment in energy and we feel like we got a broad-based understanding what's going on in the human economy. pointblank the rest of the world as they are. they are beginning to be there more significantly and the american community is not there. so what is the usa pc and what a week claiming to do to shift the narrative here in washington and drive change? first of all we have come together to liberalize the trade

between the cuban economy and the primary purpose of ending the embargo. i do understand there have been discussions around how far the president can go and we certainly welcome the announcement on december 17 but in our conversations with the administration we know full well that even on the financing side the executive order will only take us so far. quite frankly we are hamstrung by her ability to use u.s. financing with cuba so we very much need the embargo is a necessary step in allowing us to have meaningful trade. we are reenergized to establish cuba as a market for u.s. agricultural products and currently there are 11 million students then it's a natural market. 90 miles off of our coast. certainly none of us are in could say that cuba is at the top of the list in terms of

markets for their company but what they can say is that makes absolutely no sense that if we have a partner close to our folks whereas the national market we should not be denied an opportunity to trade with them. as our coalition we have four goals. we are going to advance a constructive dialogue in washington on u.s. cuba relations. we are going to actively engaged to end the long-standing embargo. we are going to work with key stakeholders to drive momentum towards historical change in 2015 and we are going to take public platform to explain the imperative of trade liberalization with cuba. i'll give you a few statistics because even though we have been able to sell to cuba since 2002 and we saw this in a agriculture community through 2008 u.s. agricultural sales have declined significantly since then. where it reached $700 million in

sales in 2008 we are around $450 million in sales now. u.s. rise, cuba used to be the largest export market. u.s. rice is no longer exported to cuba and let me restate that. u.s. rice indicates cuba was its largest export market. that may come as a surprise two. the soy industry they say cubans use a lot of soy oil and it's also a necessary and put into animal feed. 99% of the cooking done by cubans is using soy oil. while in 2002 to 2012 the soy growers have about a 70% market share that decline to 40% in one year. we have been making zero sales and to cuba at the moment. they're estimating that to be a 250 million-dollar loss and they believe the cubans are paying

three times the price for transporting agricultural products to cuba. this is about the affordability of fear -- food in the cuban market. cubans are spending too much money on financing food and transport of food. bottom line they are spending too much money on food. at the end of the day the brazilians the vietnamese argentinians are all using our market and it's an unnecessary for them to do that. and again while we think it's a market -- margaret marcus i would like to express to us is not a single trade flow of u.s. commodities going south. why do we believe there needs to be an absolute normalization of relations? this is about the broader american business community being able to take the chance to advance sales of goods and services and capital capital

into the market. we believe through the broader development economic development in the cuban market will gain but not only that the 11 million citizens of cuba again. those are 11 million citizens who have been under a policy experiment for 54 to 55 years. it's a failed policy experiment in what i can say is if you are a farmer and you plant the seed the same way in year one and you tried again the same way in year two and then after 55 years who are still doing the same thing but that seed is not germinated them popped up and taken advantage of photosynthesis and ground wouldn't you think about doing something differently? that is what is upon us is changing the status quo. there is a negative narrative out there. our coalition last week had a broad subset of bipartisan

support. this is a bipartisan issue. we have senator jerry moran from kansas and senator klobuchar for minnesota. we have a democrat from california. we have rodney davis republican from illinois and kevin cramer republican from north dakota. the secretary of agriculture which i believe is the first cabinet member since the embargo to stand up for the embargo was their governor nixon from missouri who agreed to work on a bipartisan basis to build other support from republican and democratic governors across the nation. so it's a bipartisan issue issue. one thing we do remember is that cuba are offering benefits to the other wto members and we are simply not in the game. we will require normalization. we believe it's not only a majority of congress is on our side but we also know the

majority of the american people are on our side. so at this point what we can say is that we certainly recognize the history the difficulties and the emotion and the pain of the past but what we know as the u.s. agriculture coalition for cuba is that we can collectively on the future. that is what we can own. i would submit to the business groups in the room today that often get steered down the course of moderation on this policy or it's too tricky to talk about actually join us, stand up and recognize we have a lot of things on our plate from transpacific partnerships to ttip but we can't lose sight. why wait one more day? why wait until 2015? why wait for another president? we welcome conversations with the u.s. and coalition on cuba and i'm hoping for questions. thank you.

>> thank you devry. jake we will turn to next. >> thank you john and thanks for putting this on. for those of you who don't know we are a business association based in washington d.c. at one of the things we have done since 1997 as we have run a coalition called usa engage which opposes sanctions and promotes the idea of u.s. engagement in the world. as the u.s. engages where a complement to what devry is doing on agricultural site. you have done a lot in a short period of time it's really impressive. i think devry has done a good job of laying out the case for normalization so i would be remiss if i didn't say we support that but rather than saying the same thing that devry just said about why normalization is good and important and should happen now i thought i would focus on a few other things. the first is the importance of announcement made by president obama to the business community

and also some longer-term challenges aside from the sanctions to reestablishing trade investment ties between the united states and cuba. on the announcement it's just really good news. this is a fundamental change in u.s. cuba policy. wasn't half measures are couched in rhetoric. what it does is it flips the debate upside down so this is the first time since 2000 when congress was passing the trade sanctions reform act where we have a policy of engagement that opponents have to respond to. the other thing that does is it sends a signal to the business committee that it's okay to express interest and explore cuba. i think there will be a lot of curiosity from business community. it's been off the market for so so long long city with a lot of interest in exploring the situation on the ground. i think that the administration's announcement will do what the president's announcement will do will enable

that curiosity and enable businesses to start exploring cuba. i'm going to go through a couple of provisions that have been announced so far that i think are of particular importance to the business committee. the first is establishing licenses for travel. the fact the treasury will license travel will significantly expand the ability of americans to go to cuba and for businesses and entrepreneurs to get a feel for the cuban market. the second thing is enabling credit card processing relationships. this is good for americans who want to go on the ground want to go to cuba and use a credit card but it's also good seeking payment for goods. it will protect international property and trademarks. the third provision that's important for u.s. businesses as permitting u.s. owned entities to engage in financial transactions with cubans that are located in third countries. this has been a gigantic point

particularly for u.s. banks who would have to deny accounts to cuban nationals living in the country like spain. so i think there is also those provisions seem clear to me that they will be enacted in a couple of weeks in rules that treasury will put out but i think there are other areas that presence announcement and the white house where we need to wait to see what's going to happen. the first is what will the extent of enabling services be? travel service providers will be allowed to provide service to the u.s. travelers going to cuba cuba. will ups be able to deliver up packages john tavares enqueue back? i don't think that's clear yet and there are some references that are a bit vague and the fact sheet. one is exploring additional options for promoting the growth of entrepreneurship in the private sector so that may or may not come in an initial

tranche of regulations. my read of the presence authority is similar to bob's which is he can use as licensing authority abroad so one thing i've been suggesting is important united states products made by cuban entrepreneurs so you can license ebay and engage cubans on their platforms to sell things into the united states. i'm not sure that's going to be part of the initial tranche of regulations that does seem like the sort of thing that would be consistent with the presence announcement. so that's the short term. i think the longer-term the enthusiasm and a the curiosity that exist now is going to be tempered by the stated u.s. policy in and the fact that sanctions exist and are out there but also by the reality on the ground in cuba. the limiting factors that sanctions will present until there's a full normalization of

relations with the long-term opportunity depends on more than an end to sanctions. for businesses shutting off sanctions is not like turning off the spigot to foreign investment. trade investment will occur even when sanctions are totally gone and will be affected by first and foremost the economic element in cuba so to the extent cuba can purchase things from abroad and support investments on the ground in cuba trade investment will expand. the second thing is that lower like on policies to the cuban government. if you're looking at trading with cuba you will care about customs facilities transparency and doing business ability and willingness to protect copyrights. cuba doesn't always score high on all those metrics in part because they're ambivalent about the relationship with the local economy. they want a trickle and not a flood of foreign investment trade and they are wary of being

too dependent on the united states. i think all of that is changing and there's a new vibrancy and cuba. raul castro is trying to engage internationally so we will see where that goes but it do think these will be limiting factors even when sanctions go away so i will stop there. >> thank you jake. john kinney around us out here? >> i will turn out to be redundant and i apologize for my voice. a little laryngitis. i think many people listened and saw and read what the president announced and heard, saw and read what they wanted. they didn't necessarily listen to what he said or how he said it nor did they listen to the cuban response. if you look at the optics president obama wore a dark suit

stood at a podium spoke for 15 minutes am what if he wanted to do to the cuban people for the cuban people and with the cuban people. president castro spoke for three minutes sitting at a table wearing a military uniform. they still feel they are under attack and many of them still feel there are war wounds. cuba is only going to permit what it believes it can control. it's not a criticism, just a fact. one of the challenges is missing the belief that somehow cuba is due by 90 miles south of key west florida and archipelago at 11.3 million people that has so much money flowing and waiting for the currents to push it

north. cuba develops its trade relationships not solely based on cost but also on politics. again not a criticism. countries do that throughout the world. to give you a little history from 1980 to 1992 cargill engaged in trade with cuba by $5 billion worth. 1946 libertad allows for private settlements to the u.s. companies. it reauthorizes putin had fails. there have been little health care product sales in cuba since 1992. while in large measure is because cuba would rather have a political issue than health care products for its people.

in addition products are expensive in the united states. and they can get products from other places and get it with financing. some years ago come to work out an agreement with the catholic church and the agreement was that they would be able to provide for the third-party verification. part of cbs's health care products will be used in tourism etc.. they said they would be willing to do that. from the business community standpoint we thought that was a slam dunk. took away an issue that had been disrupting exports at the same time it was able to solve a problem. the cuban foreign ministry went went -- and they said basically you have just destroyed our ability to use that as an issue. i'm not saying they always want to do that but it's a component

that needs to be thought of here. from december 2001 through november of last year u.s. exports totaled about $5 billion $5 billion, just a shade under $5 billion that's in cash and the payment terms have been cash in advance as cicero requires. the cubans balked after fizz for a was signed into law or they didn't buy anything for a year and the u.s. business community and add groups and others basically said we worked all this time and now they are saying you won't buy anything because you can't get financing. we will focus on other countries and then in december of 2001 they came back after the hurricane and said we are going to make a one-off purchase just want just to replenish products that were damaged and the hurricane. they did not buy wood for a couple of years but they began

the process and over that time there have been changes. the bush administration actually relaxed the payment terms. and then later in its administration because of abuses with travel to cuba they went back and they reversed it. president obama is reversing it again. my point is that when folks want to focus on everything that we want to do down there cuba also has to make some changes and cuba hasn't had to make a lot of changes changes because they're up in countries that have been willing to support it. currently venezuela so i would argue there right now the u.s. relationship with cuba is far less meaningful to cuba then is cuba's relationship with venezuela. venezuela has issues and they have already decreased slightly

they're subsidized oil exports to cuba. that's going to create an impetus for cuba to make changes that it does not want to make. it could result in a special period in cuba which took place after the ussr change its relationship. so there's a lot going on that you need to review. financing is one of them. you have heard some discussions about that. cuba didn't stop buying from united states because it couldn't get financing in 20. as a matter fact u.s. companies when it was being negotiated push some of the ag groups to support financing in the business community and exporter said nau because cuba has horrible credit and we don't want to be standing in line with everyone else trying to get her money so i counsel present was

able to go-round the world and say cuba is the safest export market in the world with u.s. companies than it is. cuba has never been below 50th out of 223 export markets globally in the united states. that's impressive for a small country on a cash basis. those that are arguing the embargo needs to be listed legislatively a think or make a mistake because so much can be done through the executive branch and financing cuba has been more focusing on reestablishing relationships with existing training partners commercially and politically. china russia iran mexico spain brazil and those countries in many cases have government operated entities. cuba buys rice. they generally buy rice from vietnam which are state run

entities so why did they do that because vietnam gives them one, two and three years to pay for rice and when they go into default very many people know about it and they would refer -- or for that way. it's what they want us to do down there and what they can afford to have us do down there. it was amazing after president obama's remarks we saw the same after fidel castro stepped down that people were running to see if they could get on a plane and go down there. they have a long way to go but from our perspective, from united states perspective it's best to move slowly because focusing back on where we were in 1959 when it comes to cuba don't focus on anything five years back because that's basically what your reality is going to be. your reality is going to be

changing yearly so looking way back to evaluate what may be in the future i don't think we should spend a lot of time doing that. more importantly is to look at what cuba is and look at it realistically. 11.2 million people with a small economy and with the government that has horrible credit. the most important from a business perspective right now you do have a triangle. cargo sent something to cuba and the cubans will use a bank in another country and send it to the u.s.. direct correspondent banking so that can take a day or two. direct correspondent banking that money goes to chicago within several hours and is more efficient and less expensive but

here's the challenge. some years ago that was an idea that the bush was considering and counsel and some of the companies went down to the cubans and said this is something that would certainly be helpful in the cubans said here is a challenge. your government still wants to change us and we understand there are federal laws and the laws and regulations put into place after 9/11 that requires any foreign bank that wants to do business with the u.s. bank to open its books to make sure they are not money laundering so the cubans said at that point how is this beneficial to us to open our books to the government that wants basically to put us out of business? so this time around it's going to be interesting to see if the cubans look at this differently or if there are ways around it.

direct correspondent banking is very important. now we can go to questions. >> thank you john. we are now going to move to q&a. we have a microphone that we are going to pass around and wait for that microphone to arrive to you and when you pose your question if you could introduce yourself, your name and your affiliation we would appreciate it and others in the room would appreciate it. if you can keep your questions brief. if you want to direct them to a critic -- particular panel as you can do so but if you wanted just to be a jumble for the panel that's fine too. >> and i just interject? i wanted to make a couple of clarifying points here because john mentioned those working on the embargo might be making mistakes before you draft your question. moving slowly would be quite

painful for the cuban people. not only that, that the provide certainty we need. quite frankly it seems as americans we are tying one hand behind their backs as we see investors landing in cuba were places in the european union from brazil and other places across the globe. and i do want to put some context around at least in our conversations with cuban officials at the moment what they see in terms of u.s. sanctions if it's actually crippling their ability not only to get fti but but other fti. they need about $2 million here. in our conversations with the trade minister who goes out to other countries to bring in investment he has indicated that their history as one of having to be dependent on one country whether it's united states

whether as russia and as our colleague mentioned venezuela. quite frankly they don't want to be dependent on one country which is why they want the sanctions to end. they need $2 billion to keep their economy going so there's an imperative there. i would also take issue with the fact that cuba is venezuela's most important relationship. quite frankly cuba sees cuba linking with the globe is its most important relationship. i don't think we should be focusing on what people wore on december 17 but on what people said in the fact that the government engages with the 18 month dialogue when the u.s. business community met with a president in havana he wore a business suit. >> thank you devry. questions? right in front here. >> good morning.

doug from capital group. the board mentality that you describe which i agree with. i just spent 10 days in cuba last week. i agree with that sounds. does that live fond beyond role and fidel castro or does that die when they go? >> i think we would all like it to as quickly as possible but there are a lot of generations that have been born under it and know only it so i think the process will not be swift and i don't necessarily think that we want to be swift. i don't think we want a hilton style transition