go get 'em? don't you see sort of how that would perhaps play into the hands of isil? if so, what does it mean to say we're going to mount all of our military might and go get them? don't we have a little bit of a gordian knot in that regard? >> so the answer quick answer is -- >> sorry, that was, like, six questions. [laughter] >> i know. >> it's early in the morning. >> you typically do that to me. [laughter] so overall the answer is yes. yes, i don't believe what you just said about dropping in hundreds of thousands of u.s. forces you also said they are an existential threat. i wouldn't sit here today and say isis is an existential threat to this country. >> the broader ideology. >> but the broader ideology is one that will get inside of our bloodstream, get inside of our dna, if you will, and will

permeate over time if we don't do something about it now. so it doesn't help us to just kind of wait to do something. now, when i describe, you know, in what i recommended about, you know the combination of elements of national power i mean, you just look at the information campaign that is being waged not by just isis, but by al-qaeda writ large and the way that they're able to do it the sophistication that they're able to do it, i mean, that campaign alone the military has some little bits and pieces of trying to counter that on a tactical battlefield, but there has to be a broader imagination that this country working with partners and working with some of these, you know, these so-called moderate nations. and i say that in my statement about we have partners out there -- and, you know we've got to really be honest with ourselves about some of these partners. >> [inaudible] >> we can't continue to fund and do all these kinds of things and have some of these nations sit

at the table with the united states of america when, in fact, we know that they're funding some of these organizations. that's a diplomatic tool that we have to leverage. there are economic tools that we have to leverage. when we say that we're going after terrorist financing ask we're going to stop this guy -- and we're going to stop this guy, we're going to shut down this money being made by the oil refinery those are tactical things. we have to look at how are we dealing with the moderate frankly, the moderate arab world and these nations where we do have economic partnerships and relationships, and we need to ask them are they doing everything they can from the role of being moderate? >> let me clarify and i think dr. lynch would agree, you know, i'm not going to say there's a moderate muslim nation. we're talking about more individual people and groups than we are one nation or another. and, you know, for instance the biggest success that we had in iraq was the anbar awakening. and that wasn't a government. that was sunni tribes rising up

and saying -- and you were there, you know -- >> i agree. i mean it took 50,000 more troops too. the anbar awakening was incentivized by another 50,000 u.s. american troops on the ground. >> that's a fascinating argument because the anbar awakening was a force multiplier of, like two million. >> but i mean, i talked to some of these individuals almost on a daily basis who were involved in this. i guess what i'm telling you, congressman, is that we have to be far more sophisticated, and we really do have to be use our imagination to defeat this ideology. tactically we need to go after isis, you know, and frankly, any of these other safe havens. but we have to be more sophisticated in our application of all the instruments of national power to be able to achieve what it is i believe we need to achieve over a long period of time as you recognize in your opening statement. >> and i won't disagree with that. the only thing i will say is i worry a great deal about the notion that people are focused on the u.s. military as the

solution to this problem. and i worry when we talk about, oh, you know the aumf has to be open ended so we can go anywhere anytime. and, believe me, i love the military, you know? >> yeah. >> you work with them you ask them if they can do something is the answer ever no? it's not. you tell them, you know you've got five guys, can you defeat -- yeah. that's just how they're oriented, and that's terrific, but that isn't always the right strategy. because sometimes there are things that military might can't do and in this case can really sort of turn it back around on us if we aren't careful. >> but there is -- and i'm sorry, because i don't want to go into too much of this but there is a benefit to applying pressure on an enemy. >> absolutely. >> i mean, so you have to not let them have a sound night's sleep anywhere where these vicious individuals exist and groups exist. and in the meantime, all the other pieces that we have to bring to bear -- and that's

really my that's my argument. and that's one administration to the next. because i think the last administration really struggled and maybe came to that realization later on -- >> it's not an easy answer. >> it's not an easy answer. >> when to apply force and when not to. there is a lot more tactics than strategy. you've been generous with the time, mr. chairman, i yield back. >> thank you. mr.-- [inaudible] >> general flynn, in 2002 the authorization for use of military force basically said the president is horsed the use the armed forces of the united states as he determines to be necessary and appropriate. why do you think we now have an aumf before us that puts restrictions on it, on things that the president claim he can do without an aumf? >> i guess my answer to that would be whatever the decision is between this body and the

executive branch of government we have to make sure -- in one sense we have to play our cards very close to our chest meaning don't discount any option that the united states of america has by telegraphing what those options are or not going to be. you know we're not going to commit troops, or we're not going to do this or that. i just think we have to play a very smart card game with the aumf. i think on this aumf thing though, like i said, that's not a comprehensive strategy. that is a component of something that we need. and like i said to the chairman, we have to make sure that we, when we lay this out to our military forces primarily -- and to a degree some inside of our intelligence community -- that they have the full authority to be able to execute the tasks that they're going to be assigned. otherwise, you know you're

tying our hands behind our back so to speak, and we're slowing the system down through unnecessary bureaucracy. >> thank you. dr. lynch, do you, do you really think that a group of bar bare thug -- barbarian thugs who would make a fellow human being kneel down before them and cut their heads off really care if they're marginalized? or do you care -- do you really think that a group of barbarian thugs who would put a fellow muslim in a cage, douse him with gas, set him on fire and watch him burn to death really care if they're marginalized? and if you think that, how long do you think it will take for this marginalization to take place? >> thank you, congressman. a great question and a really important one. i don't think they care. but the nature of their not

caring is extremely important. so basically, when you're a group like al-qaeda or a group like isil, you have two basic strategies you can pursue same as an election here, right? you can play to your base or you can try and reach out tobe the median voter. and what you're seeing with isil is very much a base strategy. they have decided that they want to mobilize the already-radicalized, the most dangerous people the disenfranchised, the ones who are already radicalized and they want to get them out to syria and iraq and to join. and so what we're seeing is that by, at least by press accounts and open source accounts the flow of foreign fighters is increasing. in other words, those brutal videos are actually inspiring a that very small number of people and getting them to leave cairo, to leave tunis and come out to, come out to isil. but at the same time they're alienating the broader mainstream public. so the way i would reframe your question is, is this drying up their pool of recruits faster

than they can get them and extract them and bring them into their fight? and i think that the answer to that is still unclear. and that's why i'm advocating a strategy in which we try and shirt their marginalization -- accelerate their marginalization and alienation from that broader pool of potential recruits. and so, no, i don't think they care in the slightest. many of you remember the old battles between zarqawi and zawahiri and zarqawi's response to criticism that he was alienating muslims by butchering shiites was saying, i don't care. i'm closer to god than you are right? i don't care about the mainstream muslim who has already abandoned god. he chose a base strategy whereas, you know -- and which is what isil has done as well. so we need to recognize that and then try to make them pay the cost for that base strategy. >> and that cost is? >> that cost is to continue

to -- i think we've already started this, and i think our arab allies have done this -- is really strong communications campaigns to highlight their barbarity, to highlight their extremism, to deplait their pretendings -- deflate their pretensions to power, and to puncture their mystique in such a way that the alienated, disenfranchised youth in tunis or in libya doesn't see it as an attractive, noble or heroic thing to go and join this group. and i think that that's the way we need to approach them to undermine them and deflate them rather than go exaggerate their capabilities. >> i thank the gentleman. mr. o'rourke. >> thank you mr. chair. general flynn, thank you for your testimony, for your service. i think you made a number of excellent points including the need to have a clear and comprehensive strategy from the administration before we move forward with an authorization for the use of military force.

you also talked about our need to rethink our relationships with our regional allies and i think you said something to the effect be they fail to adhere to global standards and norms and values in international law then we need to rethink our ties. and i think you may have even said cut off those ties. when i think about our allies there, the royal family in saudi arabia, the prior leadership in yemen, al-maliki prior in iraq sisi, these are governments that in many cases are amongst the most corrupt or screenal or repressive -- venal or repressive in the world and yet they are our allies in this fight. how do we pursue a strategy in that region and be consistent to the advice that you gave us which i think is really good advice? and i think those repressive

regimes and our relationships with them complicate our ability to be effective in the middle east. >> yeah. so thanks very much for asking that question. this is the essence of the problem. this is not a military phenomenon that we are facing back to the ranking member's you know, missive about what he was talking about with military and boots on the ground and everybody sort of throws that phrase around. we need to stop using that, by the way, we need to really understand what does that mean. this is a social, a cultural and a psychological phenomenon particularly in the arab world, and the potential breakdown of sort of arab world order over time if we do not change this mindset and really move some of these countries to change their internal behavior what we saw in egypt as an example of, essentially, three regimes --

now president al-sisi in there. and what president al-sisi's trying to do is he's just trying to bring a sense of stability and security before they can even think about returning to any kind of prosperity. i think a country like jordan, the king there and how they treat their population and how they are being, you know really exceptional, moderate example within this very, very difficult part of the world that we're in, there are others, there are other templates, if you will out there. but the underlying conditions that i think everybody recognizes, all of us recognize if those underlying conditions don't change then what is going to happen is this problem is going to continue to grow, and it's going to undermine the stability of these countries to the point where they're going to lose. they're eventually going to lose. and it's not just iraq and syria

and what we're seeing there. i mean we're already talking about, you know, a lot of other places around the trans-region area that are at risk. i mean what just happened with this separatist movement down in yemen, in this movement's been going on for a long long time. and then, of course you've got al-qaeda that took over this military base. i mean libya -- those two states right now -- and you could, we could, you know, we should look at ourselves, those two states right now are failing or failed states or will become that way because who will recognize yemen? will it be us or is it going to be iran? iran fully backs that separatist movement that just took over yemen, and that was a country that we were trying to defeat this threat, this sunni version of radical islam. so, i mean, this is really -- that's the essence of the problem. and we have to look at how do we want to act. when somebody sits at the table

of the united states of america they better be sitting there fully recognizing international law and at least having an, a recognition of internationally-accepted norms and behaviors. be they don't, we're being hip -- if they don't, we're being hypocritical. >> and i wonder if we have the will to act on that and to really deliver some consequences -- withdrawing military aid, isolating those countries, rethinking our relationships. in the past we have proven unable to do that or unwilling for probably important tactical or strategic reasons. and i think we'll really be tested right now. my time's up, thank you -- >> and real quickly, we're not chained by oil, the united states is no long or chained to the middle east for oil. that's a big deal. so sorry. sorry, chairman. >> appreciate it. mr. lamborn. >> thank you, mr. chairman. general flip i've got a question for -- general flynn i've got a question for you.

i'm really concerned that just this week president barack obama was interviewed and compared fighting isis to a big city mayor fighting crime. and that really troubles me because there's no comparison. that's a horrible and poor analogy. in a big city if you have criminals like muggers, carjackers, drug dealers, they're not trying to kill the mayor and take over the city government. which is what isis is trying to do in the various countries in the middle east. and they want to take over and destabilize jordan and sabia, ultimately go -- saudi arabia, ultimately go after israel. there's just no comparison to a big city mayor fighting crime. are you troubled by that type of analogy, and does that indicate to you like it does to me that he just doesn't get it? >> what i have said is that you

cannot defeat an enemy that you do not admit exists. and i really really strongly believe that the american public needs and wants moral intellectual and really strategic clarity and courage on this threat. i mean, there is no comparison. and it's not to take away the danger that exists with the thugs and the criminals that are in our this many our own system -- in our own system. but that's not what it is that we are facing in this constitution that we're having right now. in this discussion that we're having right now. it's totally different. >> also let me change subjects and ask about guantanamo bay. and this was an interesting exchange over in the senate the other day, and my friend and colleague, senator tom cotton of arkansas, was talking to an administration official and making the point that the fight

was brought to our homeland before guantanamo bay ever existed. and even if the president succeeds in shutting it down, the fight will continue against us. so do you agree with me that it's important to have a place where we can detain the worst of worst until -- which takes them out of the fight -- until such time as maybe they go before a military tribunal or in some way face justice, and that that outweighs whatever prop began b da effect these -- propaganda effect the bad guys have who will find something to criticize us for if they don't have that? >> yeah. thank you for asking that question. a couple things. there are three ways to deal with the terrorist; you kill them you capture them, or you turn them and you work with these partner nations around the world. and the saudis actually had a

pretty effective program a few years back where they were turning with them, dealing with their families and things like that. those are three ways to deal with a terrorist. we say -- and this gets back to the question on the aumf. because right now we're not capturing anybody. i mean, we might go out and detain somebody and, you know, and it's work between the military and the fbi like we did with this guy in libya, but there's a lot of other there's a lot of others out there that we probably would benefit from capturing. i mean we used to say when i was in the special operations community that had we not had the ability to professionally interrogate those that we capture, the high value targets or the mid-value targets, we might as well take that cadillac and bring it on home and park it in the garage. because the capturing of individuals in this environment is actually, it's the best form of intelligence that you can get. period.

bar none. i've lived it i've run those facilities and we know how to do them very professionally because we learned a really ugly lesson, you know over ten years ago now. so you have to be able to do that. >> thank you. mr. chairman i yield back. >> mr. cooper. he's not here. [inaudible conversations] >> yeah, ms. graham. >> first, thank you very much for being here this morning. you've touch toed a bit on other -- touched a bit on other terrorist groups in the region. could you please provide an update on hezbollah? thank you. >> i'll give it a shot, and you guys can talk. so hezbollah is an iranian-backed group. they are i believe we are still designating them as a terrorist organization. our state department. hezbollah is deeply involved in

in syria. they are fighting in syria. members of hezbollah are fighting, and they're actually leading and doing some of the some of the sort of what i would call, you know, sort of special operations type training of some of the syrian forces. hezbollah is involved in yemen. hezbollah is certainly involved in lebanon and some of the disruption of things in that particular country. and hezbollah is involved in iraq as well. is so members of hezbollah are, in fact inside of iraq fighting with what i would describe as what we used to call the badr core organization which is, which we know is led by members of rapp's ir -- iran's irgc. so hezbollah is a very dangerous organization. they are responsible for killing, killing many, many americans. and we need to not let them sort

of get a pass on any of this. >> thank you, congresswoman. let me just say very quickly that hezbollah actually has been in a very difficult position for the last several years because of its role in syria which has been quite controversial. exposed now in ways that it never was before. it enjoyed in the past a very solid and, basically, impregnable base in the south of lebanon and the shia community of lebanon and from there it was able to play a dominant role in not just shia politics in lebanon, but in the overall lebanese political system. now lebanon is a state that is hanging on by its fingernails and more than a million syrian refugees, growing signs of sectarian conflict and violence and even a lot -- i mean, there's increasing signs of grumblings among the shia middle class community itself saying what happened to to protecting our interests? why are our boys going out and dying in syria? but also at the same time

radicalization of those shia communities saying why aren't you fighting israel why aren't you doing more? so the leadership of hezbollah is clearly, i mean yes, it's clearly a dangerous and, treatmently capable and robust organization, but this is probably the most difficult political situation it's faced in many, many years. it no longer can claim to speak for a broad resistance to israel. nobody believes that anymore because they've seen -- no sunnis believe that because they've seen hezbollah men out there killing and murdering sunni civilians. so they've lost that card. and they're much weaker because of the lebanese state is much weaker. so it's a very difficult time for them, and they're having, i would say, a very difficult time navigating this new situation. >> thank you, congresswoman. the only thing i would add is that i mentioned the word "sectarianism" numerous times in hi oral testimony -- my oral testimony. i find to be a very important issue that we have to understand one of the ways extremist

ideologies can become more mainstream is when societies are polarized and people feel they have no choice but to pick a side. and the only candidates for their vote, so to speak, are extremist os in this -- organizations in this very polarized environment. so i worry about the sectarian violence in syria being exported to neighboring cups and creating a wider -- countries and creating a wider conflict. hezbollah is one of the organizations that could be a conduit for that spread of sectarian violence and lebanon as a country with a very interesting sort of denominational system of representation is really the kind of country that would be vulnerable to sectarian violence going forward. >> thank you. i appreciate the update. >> mr. whitman. >> thank you, mr. chairman. gentlemen, thank you so much for joining us today. thank you for your testimony. general flynn, how worried are you about american citizens becoming radicalized training overseas and returning back to the united states? and are there additional steps

that the u.s. should take in addressing those citizens that travel to train with isis in syria and iraq and then later return back to the united states and the threats that they would pose here? i'd like to get your perspective. >> yeah. first, i think that our fbi and the leadership of the fbi is doing a phenomenal job dealing with this issue here in the homeland. just to give you a little perspective of when somebody shows up to syria okay? and this has been going on for a while, they do a little vetting of who these individuals are. and if it's somebody who just came over to, you know, to sort of get their jihad on so to speak, they may just tell 'em you're going to be a suicide bomber, here's what we're going to do, here's where you're going to operate and go forth and do good. in the other parts of the vetting, though they look for individuals who have different skill sets, who have savvy with

the internet, who have some leadership skills, who maybe have some engineering capabilities. so they're sophisticated in how they recruit particularly when they arrive. and those individuals then get put into a different pipeline. they may not get put into the suicide attacker or vb/ied pipeline they may get put into another pipeline. and those are the individuals who there will be sort of a different future for them to maybe come back to this country and get involved in additional recruiting, additional activities and maybe, you know larger scale types of attacks that we're trying to avoid. so i just think that variety of reasons why they get e recuted. the internet is a big, big part of this. i think our fbi's doing the best job they can but we really need to recognize and track who these persons are. and be honest with you, if somebody is going to conspire to

fight against us which is, essentially, what they're doing, there also has to be a discussion at least about their citizenship. >> so you think that the additional steps is to look very carefully at those people who travel. of course; my concern too is turkey a conduit for people traveling into syria and those areas. are there additional steps we should take in working with turkey to be more aggressive with them, looking specifically at those folks who have left the country but some kind of provision on their return about the conditions on their return back to the united states? give me your perspective. >> yeah. so the combination of intelligence and law enforcement is a big deal and gets right at what you're talking about. so we have to make sure that there are good mechanisms in place, processes in place to rapidly share intelligence, rapidly share law enforcement, sensitive law enforcement information, and we need to be able to do it with a variety of partners. turkey being probably one of the principal ones right now because

be we know somebody is getting on a plane out of laguardia or dulles to fly over to ankara then we need to make sure we recognize who they are and they're being tracked, they have the right visas. and then, you know, turkey needs to know what they're doing over there. and this is one of those definitely things because we're trying -- difficult things because we're trying to protect our own freedom to travel. we've got to know why are you going there? are you part of a private organization that's going to provide humanitarian assistance or for some other ill-galten gain? ..

>> from my perspective, the last decade plus of war, if i had to give you one lesson learned that lesson learned would be that we failed, that we continue to fail to understand the threats that we face. and that failure is leading to a mismatch in strategy and resources that we are applying against these threats. and, therefore that failure is leading to these types of things that we are seeing in a yemen, and in other parts of the

greater arab world. and i think the second, third fourth order affects of libya, i'm really concerned about post a period of time in afghanistan based on what we have heard we are already going to do. i noticed the "washington post" today this article there about what are rethinking our timeline for departure from afghanistan. i think that's appropriate. so that failure led to a mismatch in resources and strategy as to how we applied it against this enemy. >> thank you esther chairman i yield back. >> thank you, mr. chairman. thank you all for being here and for your presentations. general flynn, could you fall up a bit on your comment just after because you are talking of the lessons learned about the mismatch and the threats. would you make the same analysis about even our not understanding the countries, iraq for example, when we went into iraq and they have created more enemies than friends.

how would you respond to that? >> yeah, i think that that's a very, you know what you are implying is very true. and i think that we, you know, in the spectrum of conflict when we define the spectrum of conflict, we in the military look at it from peace to war. the political damage to mention of the country to look at it from peace and get us back to peace in order to get us out of war. and we did not, we don't do a really good job thinking past the point of conflict or the point of war. we have to do that. i think that's part of this debate. as the ranking member was highlighted, we have to not just throw military resources at this thing, we have to be far more sophisticated your but that's not cover his right now. that sophistication, i don't see it and i've been studying this problem for a long time and i'm

hopeful we can get our act together but it has to be one that is very very comprehensive and it's going to be a older generational problem. there are matters out there that we do need to encourage. somebody sent me a note if the defense had, hey there's 126 subject matter experts clerics and others in the muslim world that came out strong against isis. why aren't there 126,000? why are there only 126? there's that many mosques in baghdad. there should be thousands and should be leaders of these countries that we're dealing with a need to stand up and make a statement, make a strong statement about what it is we are doing or not doing. >> thank you. right now i think there are perhaps some opportunities that we are not using. i'm thinking of the peshmerga in kurdistan.

but have you had any thoughts about that, why we're not utilizing and doing as good a job as we can english facilitating greater involvement on their behalf? they're asking for it we are not doing it. it. >> yeah, i mean i think that's a great question to ask you know, especially from this committee. so yeah, we could do more and we could give them more support. we could help in training them, giving them more sophisticated and could put in the right kinds of military tools. again, we need to be careful that we don't always get drawn back into what is actually the easiest part of a strategy, which is to throw a military force at. >> i can't agree with you more on that. >> we have to be more sophisticated. >> if i could -- just shifting to another region, boko haram. before the senate intelligence committee yesterday the growing connections between isis and the

boko haram was mentioned but i don't know whether you have to hear that that discussion, but shouldn't, i mean we are even in terms of the aumf are we thinking about that connection and i guess the horrible potential that that would bring us will? >> i will let bill into this because i think he mentioned boko haram in a statement. one, number one, boko haram is incredibly vicious. i mean, my god, look at what they've done to children, young women. these are children. so, and i can't put that aside but now so the connection between these organizations is very real. and we know we know that al-qaeda, so the al-qaeda command control, al-qaeda senior leaders were, in fact, dealing with boko haram in a sort of cursory way when bin

laden was still alive. so this is not some connection edges all of a sudden happened and boko haram has popped up. hopefully you have seen general rodriquez, our commander of africom talking about we need a whole sort of counterinsurgency effort. and again again i think there seven or eight nations in africa that trying to come to grips with dealing with boko haram now. they just postponed their elections. again, this is a long-term problem and these groups are, in fact, connected. >> thank you. i think my time is up, and perhaps dr. lynch can bring this up later. >> mr. coffman. >> thank you, mr. chairman. just a question about isis. i served in a rack in the marine corps in 2005 in ramadi in fallujah in 2006 and in the western euphrates. what i found in the sunni arab

population is they clearly didn't like as. we have set -- we upset the apple cart. they saw the government in baghdad as a shia dominated government, sector and government was against them and they were against the government. but when they saw later on a path, the figures between the al-qaeda element and the local insurgents became more significant overtime -- these years. when they saw a path where they could be a part of the government then then those fissures exploded between the two. and i found them to be a very moderate people, boys and girls went to school together in these towns, secular curriculum, annual exams and very dependent upon a lot of government services. and so it's hard for me to envision them subjugated to this

radical islamic group, isis. just they were temporarily in line with al-qaeda, and then they broke up. so what's the prognosis here? and i will refer to each one of you. >> thank you, congressman. i think you are right about that and about the nature of the iraqi sunni community and the resentment, both of us and especially of the shia dominated government. one of the great strategic missed opportunities that we've had in the middle east was that nouri al-maliki was unable to capitalize on that and to rebuild connections with the sunni community. instead you decide to roll into sectarian way going after sunni leaders, not getting the awakening forces into the armed security forces. there was a tragic missed opportunity. i think that your also right

about the long-term implausibility of people like us being willing to live under a isil. the problem right now though i think is that sectarianism is gone, has become so intense and so deeply ingrained. you are talking about population with enormous levels of display by both internal and refugees people who have seen family members being butchered on sectarian ground. and an endless amount of mistrust of state institutions like the ministry of the interior and iraqi security forces which makes it difficult for them to look at the iraqi government as a partner. and i think that until they're able to look at the iraqi government and see it as a viable partner, and it's going to be difficult for them to make that leap that in the back in 2006-2007. that's why they getting a new prime minister in place and time to begin some serious security service reforms, institutional reforms is what you need to in order to win in iraq. and reversing that securing is was going to be extraordinary

difficult at this point but we have to begin taking those steps. i think the national guard project that they have begun to work on i think is the right way to do it. something which is institutionalized and can't be dissolved at the stroke of a pen the way the promises to incorporate the awakenings were done back in '08-'09. >> thank you mr. congressman. i would just reiterate, start research extensive surveys in the muslim world and the iraqi population is overwhelmingly secular in how to respond some of the national level polls even within the last two years. and to me if sectarianism trumps secularism the way it has in iraq because of these identity politics that are being leveraged by groups like isil, then we better make sure that our national strategy to address violent extremism in other places really pushes back on

sectarianism. because it's such a powerful force, the force of nature. if we don't do with sectarianism, isil, aqim and these groups have relatively easy time forcing people to pick a side through violence. >> really briefly a lot of lessons learned between the ways zarqawi operate on the way al baghdad is operating and that is been a discussion within the ranks of the al-qaeda movement. so they learned lessons in ways zarqawi did things end out baghdad is avoiding many of those mistakes. and then really three things come incredible levels of corruption, within the governments, in this case iraq lack of inclusiveness which is very real and even though the new president that is in there now, still there's not a sense of that other people come and just a real desperate economic conditions that these people live within and that's going to be a difficult thing to change but it could change because these countries actually have

the wealth to provide for their citizens. >> mr. chairman, i yield back. >> thank you very much, mr. chairman. thank you, gentlemen, for being here today. each of you has made point throughout this morning about how this sectarianism is a driver for violence how the trust of the sunni tribe and people must be earned in order to take them the oxygen away that currently exists, especially in iraq for isis. how can this be done with his current strategy? you've talked about new leadership in place, talked about different rhetoric. a different way of doing things but the fact and the reality is that iran's influence over this current government in iraq continues, as it has been to their ability to any sense of control over the shia militias into their attacking and what they are doing does not exist.

and unless you go to a different model of governance and go away from this attachment to this continued policy of one single government in iraq and move to something where you're actually truly empowering the kurds where you're not having to fund everything to the baghdad government where at this point even a small margin of the weapons and ammunition that we're sending is getting to them, and empower the sunnis and about the shias in some type of three state solution. how is this current strategy and winning strategy to defeat isis publishing get to the core of this issue? >> i would just quickly, and i believe that we are going to go back to the way things work. the breakdown of the boundaries within this region are going to be incredibly difficult to get back to, not impossible but i just don't see that happening anytime soon. potentially in my lifetime.

i would say that iran is a greater problem. they do not see inclusiveness of sunnis. from the iranian viewpoint. and i think that they, like you saw in yemen recently with some of the chanting that we saw you are seeing in iraq things occur that are clearly iranian influenced come and against everything that we are trying to do. so i will leave it at that. >> thanks for the question. the problem with iraq, you are absolutely right about the role of iran and iraq. it's pervasive and it goes down the shia militias. it's in every level of the government every level of the state, security forces the kurds. they have relations with everybody in iraq because they actually have a full spectrum strategy for data with a close neighbor. i would actually not pose iran

as the primary problem in iraq i think the militias are a primary problem, and iran can use that instant when it is useful for them, and if they decide it's not useful for them and they can begin to move to try and shut it down. i think that the key point is going to be that it's impossible to have as you said it's impossible to have a strategy which is about keeping a unified state in iraq that isn't going to include some kind of tacit maybe not formal but at least tacit cooperation with iran. their role in iraq is simply too invasive and to real. and security forces can't be disaggregated and only working with sony units. and if you want to tamp down sectarianism, you can't than doubled down on the sunni-shia division of iraq and trying to work with the sunnis and fight against the shia. which needed is trying to bring that country back together, tamp down the secularism and have a state based on citizenship.

there's already been huge progress on a decentralization in the constitution. they are dealing with these issues of oil revenues and all these things, and no one is very happy with any of the solutions they have come up with but they are working on them. i think that the idea of allowing the courage to go their own way, i think at the time is not a good one. i think that certainly we should continue to support the path continue to advocate kurdish self-interest but i think the kurdish interest still are to be part of an iraq in this decentralized federal framework, and that's why it's so what is a good idea to final support militants aboard and other things through baghdad. in other words give them what did you come help them in the way they need to be helped but don't encourage the fragmentation of the state. and the key problem there, and i will finish, is that you talk about three-state solution and we've heard about this quite a lot. there's a fairly plausible shiite substate you could imagine and there's a very plausible kurdish one. there's no plausible 73rd

state other than the one isil has carved out. and that i think is not in america's interest to great you need to keep the sunni parts and the shia parts together in something that we are calling iraq. so you're going to need to find some kind of bargain by which that state can coexist and can't survive. >> thank you, mr. chairman. >> thank you. dr. heck. >> thank you, mr. chairman. thank you all for being here today. the president recent release is 2015 manchester to strategy on the white house website a strategy is a blueprint for america's leadership how we address the challenges while advancing our nation's interest, values and vision for the future. on page three of the strategies as we are leading a global campaign degrading and ultimately defeating islamic state of iraq in the levant. and on page 15 it states we reject the lie that america and its allies are at war with islam. i would disagree with the first and. i don't think we are leaving in trying to degrade a boldly defeat isil. i would agree with the second segment that we're not at war with all of islam.

we are at war with radical islam and islamic extremism yet nowhere in the strategy as that term appear. in fact, the only two times the word islam appears in the strategy when the two instances i just mention. yet climate change appears 19 times. i would ask if you think the nationals for strategy has enough specificity to adequate for the documents of the national defense strategy of the national military strategy to actually have a positive impact on executing a strategy for this, degrading and ultimately defeating isil? secondly dr. lynch, i would ask in your statement about the momentum of isil being halted, just within last 24 hours they've taken control of the city of al-baghdadi and they're knocking on the door of the airbase where we have marines any training capacity. how can you say that the momentum has actually been halted? >> in any civil war those are

actual questions and really appreciate your opening comment about validating the idea that we are not at war with islam, it's extreme important. and there's been huge debate about whether we should use the term islamic extremism or violent islam or extremist assault with a sort of thing. i actually fall into the pool i don't think it matters all that much will recall the. i think this is something we concern ourselves with grated but what we call the isil or daesh or isis or al-qaeda, i don't think it matters very much. i think this notion that it will be interesting to talk about it more but i think forming a search is not dependent, its semantics. i really believe that. in terms of momentum, i mean i think if you look at these kinds of civil wars there's constantly going to be a search and a flow and juicy movement here and they decline. and the retreat there. we've been seeing this in theory now for the last two and a half three years. basically a stalemate.

this village gets captured, this village gets lost. you can read to much into the daily pushes and flows. i think the defeat in kobani was extremely, it was big because they showed that they were not unstoppable. i put a lot of resources and propaganda efforts into this and they feel. that was big for blocking the momentum. i think we've seen them pulling back from a level. we soon going to concentrate some of their forces. we have seen them, their failure to move into irbil and baghdad. and so i wouldn't say and do what i would agree with you. there so signs every first that we're pushing them back but we stopped their forward momentum and broke the patina of invisibility which was actually aimportant i think forth the bandwagon effect. once they don't look any vulnerable that's when those tribes and other factions will start believing that it's safe to flip sides begin. so i think that's how i would describe what is to the audience if they still fluid situation.

>> so the national security strategy lays out the world which is very complex array of threats. i don't believe that the national security strategy prioritize what the united states should do about those threats. prioritizing sort of the here and now, and then sort of what like what a harry truman said post-world war ii to us and i will quote him you know he rightly understood that the soviets were a quote animated by a new an attic state unquote. so we have to prioritize, to take the strategy, the national security strategy and prioritize inside of it against the threats we are facing. the fact that we even use isil and the word islamic in the framework of islamic state it actually recognizes that, in fact, in that document in the

presence let on top of that document uses islamic state in the levant. so it recognizes, we the united states by recognizing the fact that there's somebody called islamic and somebody called a state inside of the levant. so again, we are struggling to define it as clearly as we possibly can. and it is a radical version of islam. there's no doubt about it. and we cannot allow ourselves to define something that actually they are calling themselves in a sense, and some if the enemy is calling themselves of that, why do we have such a difficult time? and everything as a real small binder thing, but the word or the acronym dish okay that we throw around now -- daesh ma that recognizes the latter part of the acronym talks about, it describes how schaum. how schaum is the levant. so it actually to me in my framework of who we're trying to understand what is we're facing,

and i've studied these guys and i don't with them, talk to them. that actually benefits them. so anyway we're using anyway we're using and and i can to describe this in the editing is because iraqis asked us to use it but the acronym actually describes al-sham which says you basically are controlling the levant which is essentially what they want to do. we have to be very, very careful about the words that we use. when we use words like mujahideen or jihad, those are recognitions of their courage and studies award like -- which means that's about as ugly a word as you can call an air of the. we don't use it. we should. >> mr. smith. >> thank you. two follow-ups. one on the notion that al-baghdadi and ice is somehow doing better than al-qaeda did and governance. there have been just as many stories out there, like i said, mosul is a disaster. and if i'm wrong about that

please correct me but from the goddess temple and there've been just as many stories of isil cutting peoples hands off a were smoking and alienating tribes. i don't really see any evidence that they're doing any better in terms of governing muslims. the one thing that they have going for them is the baghdad government. sunnis have no place else to go because, frankly, i haven't seen much improvement with al-baghdadi. they still look at the baghdad government as shiite and basically sectarian. we have had massacres of sunnis by shia militia groups he recently. i think that has more to do with the fact that sunnis are unwilling to break away from al-baghdadi and isil and it does that they are governed better. and i missing something? is there some evidence that there governing better?

that they are not doing the same violence against their citizens that al-qaeda and iraqi before? or the taliban did for that matter. >> ranking member smith, thank you for the question. i think the biggest difference is that they are going to even if they're governing poorly, most of the al-qaeda and the associated movements have never really tried to establish formal governance. >> it's a separate point. we're talking a little bit about what al-qaeda and iraq -- al-qaeda and iraqi controlled territory before the anbar awakening and they did run chatter governments, the taliban did as well. so where they have governed was the comparison. and in that sense are they doing better than the taliban dead or some of these other al-qaeda and iraq -- >> that's where magic would be the flow of foreign fighters into iraq and syria. something about the way they are portrayed to governance, iraq and syria is inspiring the largest number of foreign fighters to flow into the region. i think it's because there

quote-unquote living up to the righteous values that they espouse. they are not covered by state. they are seen as uncompromising. they are purifying islam. these kind of macho terms. and while it's horrific stuff for the base as dr. lynch mention, it's a rallying call. and that they are calling muslims to build the institutions of the caliphate, to take part in this project of reestablishing a religious political empire. and that's empowering even if the means by which they are governing is appalling. and it is seen as for some a more appealing alternative been like you mentioned, the maliki government in baghdad. >> one final point on guantánamo, conversation back and forth about that. i would not take seriously any arguments that we don't need to detain enemies. we do to the question is do we

need to detain them at guantánamo? norwood to argue with the point that you're not going to close guantánamo and have the violent islamic extremists it okay we are good. i understand that, but it is not necessary, is it, to detain them at guantánamo? the entire reason that guantánamo was set up was the belief that may we could somehow sidestep habeas corpus, but this would bring court has shut that down. is that any reason that we couldn't take these people as we have in many instances, a detained in here in the united states? >> so, we definitely need to be able to capture because if we only kill, but to me is a moral problem. >> at that but where? >> when you look at prior to 2003, they were many non-afghans detained in afghanistan. so i unicode i'm not going to

argue with you where because i think we have to decide. we have to make that decision. but to be able to do tactical interrogations speed is i've got all that. my question -- >> it would bring them into the united states and make it read their habeas corpus rights, that stops the process of being able to get the kind of information that you can get through very professionally done and interrogation. i'm telling you i've seen it. >> i've heard that argued a thousand times. >> i have been involved in thousands of interrogation operations to be able to get to that point. >> you are telling every law enforcement personnel in the u.s., every fbi agent gets no useful intelligence out of anybody that the captcha because once they mirandized them come itself and they can't get the information out? >> it's a lot slower. and i've been on both sides of it -- ranking member, i've been on both sides of it. it doesn't mean we can't have professional law enforcement representatives involved in the

process from a detention and interrogation process. >> i disagree with you on the fact that somehow aranda instantaneously shuts off the gathering of information but putting that point aside there's a reason that as we do with some of the people, you have to did in guantánamo too. the same thing as applying in both places. i guess the center question is there's no reason we couldn't the same thing here in the us that we didn't guantánamo. guantánamo does not give us any particular interrogation or detention advantage. >> you just have to make sure, there's a time in this issue, and just make sure that the conditions are set for the. again and that's kind of the legislative takes a good discussion about it would bring them into the united states what does that mean legally? i'm not a lawyer, don't know that but i just don't there will probably be a difference in addition when we bring them inside the united states because we don't have designated combat zones anymore. wherever they go we have to be able to capture these individuals to be able to get

the intelligence out of them. >> there's a difference between guantánamo and the u.s. yield back. >> mr. nugent. >> thank you, mr. chairman. and interesting discussion about guantánamo, and i absolutely, my home area, we have the largest federal prison ever, and i would just suggest to you when you detain these folks whether it's gitmo or the u.s. that's the issue. that's going to be the issue to the bad guys and their associated friends and fellows so i think i agree with the general come when to bring them back to the u.s. in a former law enforcement officer it creates a whole bunch of other issues that we have not had to deal with when they're held at gitmo. the one thing that i'm struggling with, with the president's request for an authorization, and use it on

ahead, jonathan is a clear comprehensive strategy. -- you hit it on the head. what would that look like? i guess that's why i'm struggling what is a clear comprehensive strategy look like in regards to dealing with the issue that we have in front of us? we had a king of jordan here and his comprehensive strategies you can just look at isis or isil. you've got to look at it across the world in regards to islamic extremism. >> so i mean can we talked about this business about clearly defining the enemy and making sure its company had said. i think those are sort of two parts of this end you just addressed certainly the second one. i think the third one is that we have to retake a hard look at how we are organized as a nation to deal with the tactical problem of what's happened in iraq and syria, but also we have to look at how we organize as a nation to deal with the wider longer term problem of this

radical version of islam. specifically it's the department of defense, the department of state, the central intelligence agency and the intelligence community as it supports our national interest. and i think what to look how we're organized internationally. i use the nato model as a model although it's got its shortcomings, but we need to have some sort of arab world nato if you like structure and not deal with each one of these countries as though their individual countries did with individual problems. they are all dealing with this kind of problems but i think we didn't put somebody in charge of the. i think we need to designate someone in charge that has avoid the backing of this country and the full line of authority from the president of the united states to execute authorities and it's probably civilian led but it is just somebody with that kind of gravitons but

international excepted you run this sort of campaign. should be somebody from u.s.? i believe it should be somebody from the u.s. doesn't mean that we have to have large numbers of boots on the ground. it just means we have to come together, organize ourselves first, make sure that we are organized correctly internationally, and to make sure someone is in charge at this effort. and, frankly, to the american public that this is going to last for generations. i mean this is not something that's going to go away. >> to the other panelists -- >> and aumf is not that the only component of it. >> that's the mistake i think people think a that comprehensive strategy, just part of the toolkit in regards to it. the other panelists in regards to comprehensive strategy, do you think today today at this point in time that we have a comprehensive strategy today? >> no, i don't.

i think that we have come we did a very good job rethink of assembling a coalition and stopping the media crisis, and now is the time when many deformed without long-term strategy. i think your question is exactly right. in terms of your specific question about what that might look like, i could repeat the things i said before about preventing a class of civilizations -- >> i appreciate -- >> i want to second there's something general flynn said. that if we're going to have any success in getting with isil and with extremism in the middle east, we have to make sure that our allies on the same page as we are. because they been as much a problem as the solution. extraordinarily destructive in syria and the abuse of human rights. the conference a strategy i think that's a backup of political reforms and everything else, or else it's just spitting into the wind. >> i think thus far we've been dealing with issues in an ad hoc basis of breath that's because of instabilityof the instability so-so

with the arab spring and, frankly, it was a pretty tumultuous few years. i think any strategy has to recognize that al-qaeda and isil -- >> did you believe -- >> no. i think al-qaeda and isil have pulled us into the room of nonstate actors where we are largely forced to operate in judicial terms are outside the national system for the roles of the get or set him up there and we should try to push this back up into the international system or again we have those rules working in our favor. >> thank you, mr. chairman. yield back. >> i want to thank all the witnesses for being here come a particular general flynn a fellow rhode islander. general, welcome back before the committee and thank you for your years of service. i would like probably the question before dr. lynch and also general flynn whoever wants to go first. clearly this rise of radical violent extremists didn't happen

overnight. it was allowed to fester in many ways mainly with the religious community, for whatever reason as i understand it was allowed to preach hate and violence and a lot of the leaders in the middle east kind of looked the other way, for whatever reason. it can took a lot of time to get your. it's going to take a long time to get out of it. but let me ask you do the statements from the president lcc in egypt, -- president sisi, which i found surprising but welcome, welcome statement, when he spoke to the religious community there or established sunni imams in the greater middle east who denounced the violence of isil or an islamic extremism more broadly, do they moderate or counter the nature of the grievances and the threat from jihadists in the region, or are the steps having the reverse effect of reinforcing the

jihadists ideology and narrative? can you comment on that? >> i think it's a fantastic question. thank you. i think the issue with statements like those by president sisi is not the statements of but it's that he doesn't have standing to issue those things because when he is presiding over a fairly repressive police state and putting tens of thousands of political dissidents in jail it's very difficult for him to then say oh but you must be matters and you must participate in the political system. it gets back exactly to the conversation we're having a moment ago about the need to understand that if you want to have leaders who are capable of making them leaders in the middle east were capable of making the kinds of statements that you and i would very much like to see, they need to have a standing from which to do so. right now they don't. status have been in a difficult position on this. the egyptians have been ineffective go position. so the traditional leaders of the arab world are not interest

him position right now to make the kinds of moves for moderation and against extremism that we need to see. >> so real quickly this shift in this, and the strengthening of this ideology started well before 9/11. 9/11nine 9/11 just brought it to the floor. it really was, you know, it just showed how dedicated and a long-term their vision is of what it is that they believe. and i believe that president sisi's remarks back and the late december, gender timeframe, he was talking to the egyptian people as much as he was talking to the arab world and we shouldn't lose sight of that. so despite the the challenges that egypt faces internally to try to get back to strengthen stability and security, we need leaders like that, frankly, or of them around the arab world that are willing to step up and say the

kinds of things that he said that took a lot of courage, but he also knows come he also knows yes to change inside of their own system just in egypt alone to be able to get two people to sort of come back around to be more moderate. and they're dealing with some very county without kind and elements of radical version of the most improved in that country. i was very heartened when i heard president sisi come out and make those remarks. >> so are the things that we can focus on in our strategy to help encourage that kind of moderation? let me ask you also given that there are certain actors in the region such as uae and jordan among others who appear to be supporting the u.s. interests how should the united states support and organize these partners in the region to service potentially moderate influence within the greater middle east? >> thank you congressman.

so i think one thing we can do we know that the u.s. government is gun shy to talk about what is is moderate islam and is moderate islam in which it is lumpy and other leaders in the muzzle world, don't always have the credibility to talk about moderate islam and have that authority. the one thing leaders can do is try to collectively decrease the perceived social legitimacy of violence, which is not the what kind of islam is right or wrong but it's lowering that threshold that sparked sort of revolt against terrorist organizations so that they step over that line more quickly. this is something i think we can do collectively. >> let me add one other, and that has to do with the rule of law. i think is but a strategic advantage that this country has but it is one thing we need to export around the world, not so much democracy but the idea of rule of law so people are governed by norms and behaviors that are acceptable internationally. i think that's a problem in this part of the world right now.

>> thank you all. i yield back. >> as you all know they've called vote. i think we'll have time to probably get two more folks in. mr. cook. >> thank you, mr. chairman. general flynn, for so i notice you at the university of rhode island. first land-grant universities in the country established by abraham lincoln actually be established by law. >> i know. my daughter with her and my son-in-law. i did want to know why the out of state tuition is so high. [laughter] >> i defer to my colleague. >> going back to doctor hex question about the airfield, which is in the news right now with everything else, and i think a lot of us are wondering whether this is a symbolic thing in terms of a targeting come in terms of mortars and indirect fire weapons. because the fact that there is marines there, a chance to embarrass the marines as you

know, fallujah i think was a major major political propaganda victory for them. because the number of soldiers, sailors, and marines that were killed in that city. and i'm trying to see if you had a take on whether psychologically that would be a huge victory if, you know he had tremendous casualties or what have you. that's number one press story. can you comment on that? and secondly i want you to address our lack of human intelligence. i note you talked about feedback prisoners. >> so the fact that this tactical action by isis is going on right now in essentially the village or town of baghdad the is a strategic victory for them. it is definite a strategic victory information for them.

and they are very close i've been there a number of times. we operated out of their very effectively. if i were those marines in there, i would be looking to make sure that we have that we have the rules of engagement very clear he understood to be able to deal with anything that happens against those perimeters of that particular base to what i would love to see, i would love to see an unleashing of some iraqi force with the support of our u.s. marines to go after and we take that little village. because that would be doable. and it would be something that the iraqis could actually do with the support of our u.s. marine forces that are in oslo. in terms of human we like the kind of human intelligence that we need that we used to have actually pretty can we develop it over time but we don't have that kind of level that we need

today. and interrogations is actually a part of that. >> since i still have two minutes, i just wanted, you talked about the plans and everything like that. i used to be a plans officer i had to just go. we are talking of the budget and everything else, and notably big argument is the temple of ops compared to out of control. you got to do this, this and this. we used to a fault with all the plans and everything else, and i'm wondering, are we out of control because we have a squadron for this, we just don't have enough military forces to go around for all the commitments. if you could briefly comment on the. >> right. we do not. we do not have, if you look at the menu that the national street is tragic early is in terms of the layout of threats around the world, and particularly this problem we're facing right now, our military is so stretched thin and, frankly, underresourced and parts of it are not trained to

the level that we would expect them to be but american public would expect them to be at and the sequestration commend you on know this is just choking the readiness of the united states military. we need to decide what kind of military do we want to have given the threats that we face. and right now it's grown it's gotten too small and if we continue down this path is going to get even smaller, and that's a danger to our national security. >> thank you for your service. i yield back. >> mr. skancke. >> thank you, mr. chairman. gentlemen, thank you for being here. i will try to be brief and general flynn which one statement you made about terrorism is ebbing and flowing. we shouldn't pay too much attention to it, it's is going to happen the way the middle east has come into a. up like to have this and for the record, and wonder if you've seen this.

this is a dia intelligence assessments from 2004-2014. and 2004 we're dealing with 21 total terrorist groups and 18 total countries and today we're dealing with 41 terrorist groups in 24 countries. certainly respect your opinion and agree with it on many things but i would suggest that that is more than an ebb and flow. that is a significant growth and an ideology that is dangerous to the world. i'm what would you process the population of the islamic extremists or terrorists in whatever want to call them come in iraq to become the total number of them? >> i think -- when i was talking about ebb and flow i thought about civil war dynamics and not terrorism but i was talking about the fighting underground mc specifically. so i'm sorry for the confusion. >> for the record the u.s. working to undermine aside and move them out -- assad.

i think think the u.s. made unmistakably underlined those which in this country we end up creating a vacuum that allows these extremist groups to expand. but i have read some of your statements, but the total number for iraq if you would. >> i just want to clarify that because the ebb and flow truly about the civil war to the question of whether we should have gone after assad is a question of the day. i say to go country by country you get widely different estimates. there's an islamist state affiliate supposedly in algeria which might have 20 people in the -- >> but look -- >> so in iraq what i would say is, that was your specific question, you might have something along the lines of what would you say, bill maybe 5000 dedicated, dedicated isis/isil fighters combined with the whole set of local forces who have aligned with -- >> let's use that number.

i'm trying to be fast because of what to get my colleagues a chance as well. how many fighting age men are in the backcountry? >> good question. 70 million maybe? 15 million? >> okay. but those are kurds sunnis and shiites and so on the time of the sunni community -- >> here's my point in the supply want to come back to you on, jim. if there are 5000 islamic extra misters, whatever want to call them inside the country that has 5 million fighting age men no matter what battle we went from if we get the rules of engagement right they've got, if they are moderates, that's a 50,000 to one margin. and if 50000 to one isn't enough of an advantage, then what is? so this is where, this is why so many people in our part of the

world identified this as islam. because clearly 50,000 could overrun want if they wanted to. so, general flynn my question that you specifically. if we get the rules of engagement right, which i sorely don't trust the president on but if we get the rules of engagement right there's no doubt in my mind that we can win any battle over there. but, but if they end up back at a 50,000 to one margin -- in iraq, and they can't control that, what good can we do? >> so i was asked a question back in 2002 when it first in afghanistan. and i was asked how many enemies are we facing in afghanistan at that time 2002 this is april may time frame 2002. and i said we're looking at about 35,000 at the next question was okay for children capture all 35,000, can we go home, to we went? the next part of the answer was no because there's another have

the mood on the other side of the border in this place called the thought-out pics with the same sort of analogy today -- fatah. into we deal with these others that are there these of the millions or whatever that number is, we are going to be at this a long time and that's why the military component of this makes us feel good when we do something, we kill somebody, we get a leader but it's all the others out of their ready to join this movement and fight against our value system, and that's just something that we're going to have to, that's the wider strategy. >> that's one thing training and equipping and supplying our allies becomes the most important part of this strategy. >> across the region -- >> absolutely. >> i think we're time for a couple of questions if you'd like to go ahead. >> thank you, mr. chairman thank you offer testimony. a lot of my questions have been answered. put question about trends in

africa. i was a part of the team at u.s.-africa command running current operations there and just your comments, talk told that about boko haram but aqim and al-shabaab and the trends you're seeing with those organizations. bears many of uncovered spaces that are potentially, we've seen foreign fighters flew in and out of the past when many people weren't paying attention. so any comments on the trends going on in the rest of those organizations on the african continent? >> i will defer to build on a lot of the details but one thing we'll talk about is libya and the affect that is having. i think you're seeing the emergence of what looks like an islamic state affiliate in libya. is completely unencumbered space and it is not a civil war total polarization that's having to stabilize effects on both east and west. the egyptians are extremely worried about the the tunisians are very, very worried about it. so basically the lesson is to

forget the collapse of the state and it opens the space risked some fruit is by every word about libya for all kinds of reasons but that's one of them. >> briefly, because i think i know bill is something off on this as well. the negative is that it is rapidly growing. so it is getting worse. particularly those couple of errors that you just talked about. and the other part is as market is highlighted from the breakdown of the nationstate or the order of the nationstate, if you will, in part of the region. deposit is that there are countries that understand and are trying to come to grips with it, and that's more down and there's a number, i think seven countries are trying to work against boko haram right now that come together. there are some economies are,, particularly down at the center of southern part of africa that are good models for the rest of africa but the size of the population in the 15 to 30 year old category of young men have

nothing better to do than to join these groups is probably the fastest growing population demographics on the planet today. >> great, thank you. i yield back. thank you, mr. chairman. thanks for your time. >> thanks a gentlelady. and thank you all for being here. as many topics as we got today we did get to everything. i'm sorry, to give something you, you want to add on that last point? >> thank you, mr. chairman. thank you for the question al-shabaab conducted twice as many attacks in the first nine months of 2040 as it did in all 2013. boko haram will likely be either the most or the second most lethal terrorist organization and 2014 when we finalize our data. although they're not the most active in terms of number of attacks which means their unfortunate quite efficient in creating fatalities per attack. and, of course, we just saw the first attack in chad a day or so ago, and continued attacks now in cameroon.

there's another group in nigeria that is among the 10 most active groups and 2014 associated with the tribes. so what we're seeing is increased levels of terrorist attacks and fatalities both in west africa and in east africa associate with shabaab and a lot of fluidity in north africa. >> thank you. and i think it is helpful to have some objective measurements to gauge these things. they don't tell us the whole story but did you enable us to compare the trends. the other topic we did we get today, which i think we need to understand better is this competition among groups. you alluded to it. we did quite have a chance to get to it but i think that is a very significant factor that we have not, have not fully explore. what we did get to another things. again i apologize were getting cut short a little bit because

about the guts -- but i very much appreciate you being here and assisting the committee. and with that, a hearing stands adjourned. [inaudible conversations] >> "washington journal" has been touring the nation struggle black colleges and universities recently. earlier today we visited florida a. and m. join us this week as we read at the segments on c-span2. we begin today at 6:40 p.m. with a look at howard university in washington, d.c. and later it's a tour of hampton university in virginia. a look now at tonight's primetime programming here on c-span2. all this week it is booktv. tonight's game, the war on terror. tonight on c-span at the first of three days of tech related

program. we will begin with conversations on annual tech crunch disrupt conference in san francisco. here is a brief portion. >> so here's the idea. the idea is you push a button, car comes to pick up just like normal, and while you're on your way to your destination somebody else is going along the same route at the same time and with less, let's call it two minutes or less aviation from your round, you will pick someone else up along the way. >> and they get in my car with a? >> they did in the same card you, that's correct. and what happens then is i've been -- >> it sounds a lot like a bust so far. >> understood. the difference is a bus goes record is like half a mile away from you and you wait 15 minutes and sometimes it's on time and sometimes it's not. this one comes just like you

push the button and it is there. editor when you wanted you want it exactly where you want it. that is the uber magic. and what happens come you're still getting the benefit of a bus interest of getting the benefit of carpooling by literally taking cars off the road. they are significant efficiency in doing this. >> that was just a small portion of the recent tech crunch disrupt conference. watch more tonight wednesday and thursday begin at 7 p.m. eastern on c-span. >> c-span2 providing live coverage of u.s. senate floor proceedings and key public policy events. ended the weekend booktv now for 15 years the only television network devoted to nonfiction books and authors. c-span2 created by the cable tv industry and brought to you as a public service by your local cable or satellite provider. watch us in hd like us on

facebook and follow us on twitter. >> by c-span cities tour takes booktv and american history tv on the road. traveling to u.s. cities to learn about their history and literary life. this weekend we have partnered with time warner cable for a visit to greensboro, north carolina. carolina. >> and after months and months of cleaning the house, paul halpern who have been given the task was making one more walk through and in the attic he looked over and he saw an envelope with kind of a green seal on it and walked over and noticed the date was in 1832 document. he removed a single mail from a panel an upstairs attic room and discovered a trunk in books and portraits stuffed under the eaves, and this was this treasure of dolley madison things. we have had this story and available to the public

displaying different items from time to time but trying to include her life story from her birth to her death in 1849. some of the items that we currently have on display a card, i agree calling card that has a card enclosed with her signature as well as that of her niece. ..

back to support political candidates that want to change the campaign-finance system. the current system favors wealthy country diggers at the expense of others. a problem he describes as both the public loss and how money corrupts congress and how to stop it. up next talks about the pac during the recent election of the jewish community center in san francisco. from last month, this is about one hour and 25 minutes. >> thank you. hello, everybody. and welcome to the jcpff. i'm the managing editor and i'm delighted to host all of you for a terrific evening with lawrence

lessig. i've also a special thanks to tonight's community partners hastings college of law, the school of law the creative commons and counterattack. our guest this evening harvard law professor lawrence lessig is known as the elvis of cyber law. one of the country's most influential theorists on law culture and the internet, has shifted focus to take on the corrosive effects of money on politics. last year professor lessig walked 200 michaels for the new hampshire rebellion to encourage citizens to end the system of corruption in the nation's capital. the next walker starts this sunday, and it's not too late to book a plane ticket and join him. we have flyers in the lobby. they look like this and they can

tell you how to participate. laurence lessig is here to talk about his crowd funded super pack two and all and what is in store for 2015. please join me in welcoming him to the jccsf. [applause] >> okay my computer shut down and now i have to make small talk. what should we talk about if it comes back to? the weather. it's windy cold in new hampshire. this minute is 6 degrees when we are going to be starting our walk. okay.

it's wonderful to be here in san francisco talking about something that i began here in san francisco because i was forced to begin talking and thinking about this by the dear friends of many from san francisco erin schwartz through on the second anniversary of his death is this sunday and whose memory is vibrant in this community and around the world.

but he often describes to me simple justice and he talked to people about the symbol injustice of the world that we find ourselves in. there was a growing frustration that he showed and that i followed. and one way to understand this frustration is to recognize the way in which we refuse to acknowledge the nature of the problem we are talking about so here's an example. america has been focused for the last year on a range of problems related to race in america. michael brown, the injustice of

the system that we feel is a system of inequality in a system that gets described as a system of racism and there is evidence to support the racism. a recent study of the racial distribution of the deaths in the 218 deaths involving the police tries to map the predicted incidence according to race and it is fewer than the actual incidences and then you take this and draw this out to see the actual differences. what is the probability that we would see in the distribution as or more extreme than this one. it is on the order of ten to the

minor 82. if you're not a mathematician you might wonder what is that number like ten to the minus 79 which is the probably of being hit by lightning 13 times in one year which means the probability of ten to the minus 82 is a really, really really small probability which is to suggest that there is a high confidence in the judgment that the race of the victim is related. there are a lot of quibbles that one could have with this study but what comes through in the culture is the view that this manifest racism and then that gets framed as the racism of

o'connor or the racism of the 1960s and 50s and 40s and 30s. there are jim crow racists out there but there's also no doubt that i think a pattern like this is not produced by that sort of racism. it is a more fundamental racism and more fundamental inequality and if we were to talk about how to solve that, we would look beyond the simple image and the stupid war on drugs and structural problems. but we think of a more difficult task and the task of solving this inequality without the

focus on picking up the evil of individuals. not because it is harder for people to understand these other issues as contributing to this kind of racism. but to focus on the symbol injustice is to focus on the outrage and the difference between the good and evil in the story pays a. keeping that it's simple and keeps the fury going so we get nothing done we remain angry and

focused in the symbol injustice that we see. here's another example tied directly to them to talk about today, the symbol injustice around the institution that is congress. we know that the confidence in the institution collapsed. 7% of confidence in the institution. the jewel in the crown jewel of our democracy according to the framers congress 7% of us trust. more than 50% call the institution corrupt. and when we talk about it being corrupt, we focus on people like cunningham or jack ate her -- abram off and there is no doubt that there is a quid pro quo but

also the failure of this institution is not produced by that form of corruption. it's a different kind of corruption, more fundamental. it's like bad souls engaging in criminal acts committed those engaged in the system that drives to this corruption and if we wanted to solve that, we would have to look elsewhere from beyond the prison walls. but we don't do that and we can't do that. not because it is hard but because our focus is on the symbol injustice. the outrage of thinking of the institution in good versus evil terms because it pays. it makes it easier to organize around it. it makes it easier to vilify the results that you don't like coming keeping it simple keeps

the fury going i only get nothing done in fixing the problem that it represents. the symbol injustice hides the real injustices. and the real work that it's going to take to fix it. okay. so if we wanted to think about it something beyond the symbol injustice, what would it be at least as it relates to the institution i know something about them congress? what are the real problems here? at the end of august hong kong to discovered something that triggered a revolution in the streets first i young people and then joined by young people from across the city.

what they discovered is the method that it would be forced to adopt for electing their governor. china had promised in 2007 that the chief executive by 2017 would be popularly elected that the people's congress leader of the procedure and as a described, the ultimate aim is the selection of the chief executive by universal suffrage upon nomination by the broadly representative nominating committee in accordance with democratic procedure. a nominating committee. a committee composed of 1200 citizens which means about .024% of hong kong. remember that number, .024% of hong kong. so what the chinese were describing was a two-stage process. there is an election where all the citizens of hong kong would have the right to vote but there was a nomination process where the 1200 would have to

vote. you have to do well in the nominating process to be able to run in the two-stage process with a filter in the middle between the two stages and that is what triggered the strike in hong kong because the view is that the filter was biased. protesters described the pro- beijing business and political elites as the chairman of the hong kong democratic party put it, we wanted -- suffrage not a democracy with chinese characteristics. but is this particular feature chinese? the answer is it's not unless it was an ancient chinese profit because as he put it quote, i don't care if it does the

electing as long as i get to do the nominating. we should describe the system that he was construct and. he has this form. there is two steps at least, the nominating process and electing the process in the citizens vote and a filter in between. that is the system and that is what he wanted. and of course in the history of democracy in america there's a long history most dramatically. it's embarrassing to recognize that 1870 america passed an amendment to the constitution but guaranteed to african-american males the right to vote. the perception of the time that was passed was that this would be the future of democracy in america impact for the next period the future looked more

like this. for a hundred years, just exaggerating a bit for 95 years there was a concerted effort to exclude african-americans from the ability to vote. no place more ambitiously than the state of texas, which enacted by law and all white primary. so, in the old south there is a general election where all citizens got to vote come african-americans, too if they could register. but there is a white primary where only whites get to vote and you have to do well in the old primary to be able to run in the general election. the two-stage process which excluded in the critical first step african-americans from the system with the consequence obviously that you have a democracy that was responsive to the whites only. now that's a profound and embarrassing stage of tweedism

but think about tweedism and the new america because we take it for granted that campaigns will be privately funded. funding of campaigns is an essential step to getting elected to any major office. so we have a two-stage process, nominating process where the funders go to the electing process for the citizens. now, to get the funders to vote coming to campaign on which means you have to raise money. so candidates spend for congress the candidates spend anywhere between 30 to 70% of their time raising money to run the campaign to get them elected. they do it in things like this where they have parties or they say for $500 you get to come to a reception, a thousand dollars for a photo op and $2,400 a photo op meet and greet at the reception this is the game that gets played but more importantly, they spend an

extraordinary amount of time dialing for dollars, two to four hours a day calling the people they've never met developing a sensitivity and an awareness about how what they do will affect their ability to raise money. they got this image of the box where any stupid animal could learn which buttons if needed to push in order to get the substance if needed. this is the picture of the modern american congressperson. [laughter] as the modern american congress person learns which button must be pushed to get the substance he or she needs we developed in a life like this a sixth sense and awareness about what is needed to satisfy the obligation. they become in the words of the x-files shape shifters as they constantly adjust their views and what will help them to raise money. a democrat from virginia describes when she went to congress she was told by a

colleague always go to the green and to clarify he was not an environmentalist. [laughter] so this system is a two-stage process with a filter in the middle begging the question is the filter biased and of course that depends on who the funders are. in the recent election we have the complete data and here's what we know about who they are. in 2014 about 5.4 million people contributed at least a dollar to any congressional campaign which means about 1.75% of america contributed to the campaigns. but if you take the 1.75 of america, the top 100 days as much as the bottom 7.45 million contributors. so, the top 100 games as much as the bottom 4.75 but still it is

only less than 2% of america that we are talking about. if you look at people that gave $2,600 at least, that means that about .04% of america gave 2600 about 22,000 which is a little less than the total number of people named lester in the united states which is why i called it lesterland in my talk. if you look at $10,000 or more that is .008% of america. that is 26000 americans which is a little less than the total number of people named sheldon in the united states or if you think about the effect of the supreme court decision or the decision that created the super pack. they gave 60% of the superpac money that was spent in the

united states. so whether it is lesterland or sheldon city, the point is that we have a system where the tiniest fraction of the 1% dominates the first stage in the process. a two-stage election. a general where we are all invited to participate in something that you have a mighty and not a white primary degree in primary in america and you must do well in the green primary to be able to run into the general election. there are people like jerry brown, but you believe in that you believe in your campaign manager believes you must do well in the primaries that you live your life. meaning the majority that the majority of americans. the vast majority of americans are excluded from the critical first step.

they may be only -- i'm not really allowed to show the princeton studies studies we put that off as light as quickly as we can. but they published this incredible study last year trying to measure the effect of the economic elites on the political decisions. so they gathered the largest empirical study of actual policy positions of the government in the history of political science and they try to release the actual decisions of the government to the views of the economic elites and then organized interest and the average voter. what they found with respect to the economic elites is the graph that is intuitive if you think about what this says it says the percentage favoring the proposed policy changes that it goes from 0200. the probability of the policy actually being adopted .-full-stop. so that's the way that you would expect to be more supportive and more likely it will be adopted.

something similar with interest groups too. the more that you support it, the higher probability that it goes up. this is a responsive system of the economic elites or the organized interest groups. here's the graph for the average citizens. that is a flat line. the flat line into regardless of the percentage of the average citizens who support something that has no effect on its probability of being adopted. and as they describe in english when the preferences of the economic elites and the stands of the organized interest groups are controlled for the preferences of the average american appear to have only a minuscule bond near zero, statistically nonsignificant impact on public policy. this is a democracy where the average voters views don't matter to the probability of a policy being adopted.

here is one context in which the consequences quite dramatic. we put together this graph to describe the change in the distribution of average income growth over different periods across our history coming out of the recession for examples and here's the first period that we are talking about where the bluegrass represents the percentage that's going to the bottom 90%, and the red bar is showing the percentage going to the top 10%. so, this is showing the top 10% is getting 20% come% come at the bottom present is getting 80%. you might have trouble with that or not the point is that the bottom ten, the bottom 90% is getting significantly more than the top ten. here's how that carries out across the next period. the last period the 2009 to 2012 recovery, the bottom 90% actually lose income relative to

the top 10% gain more than the total amount that would otherwise be allocated. this change according to hacker and pierson is tied directly to the changes in government policy. and changes in government policy are tied directly to the influence in our democracy. this is tweedism. it's not a system dominated by the regime of the business and political elites. it is a green primary dominated by just a business and economic elite. and the thing to see is that it is just as extreme as the story in hong kong. remember i told you .0 24% is the percentage of hong kong that gets to be in the nominating committee. well, if you asked what percentage of the voters back south to just one candidate it

would be $5200, that number into the percentage of the voters is .04%. it is just as wrong. what does it do and what is its effect? the political order and the political decay describes the area not as a democracy and not as an aristocracy and plutocracy america has become a veto and by that, he means it

is a system where it is easy now but it's to block any change. and the reason. and it is to the checks and balances and a two-hour polarized political culture. but in addition to those, it is tied to the tiny number of the founders that funded the campaign. what that means is that a tiny fraction is really tiny and that number has the power to block the reform.

whether from the left or the right fails any change including yours. everyone coming into a room like this has an issue that you care about. it could be climate change, health care debt tax policy i don't care what the issue isn't a federal level you all have an issue that you think is important and i'm sure that most of you spend an extraordinary amount of your free time if there is such a thing anymore, on that issue getting your money to support the causes that would advance this issue but the the point to see is that even if your issue is in your view the most important issue change on that issue won't happen until. this issue, this corrupting influence on the way that we fund campaigns is the first issue because it blocks the ability of the democracy to control.

it's the best writer that discovers the steering wheel is no longer connected to the axle. this is our democracy because of the influence of the way that we fund the campaigns. what's the solution here? the truth is the solution is not hard to describe. if this is the picture this tweed system and the problem is the filter the solution is to find a way either to dominate the filter or to dominate the vice. that is an example of how this can be done. the number of republicans in the spirit of teddy roosevelt perhaps, began to push the ideas like vouchers as a way to solve this funding problem. vouchers where you imagine what to say that every voter gets a voucher, think of it like a target card or starbucks card, the stored value car