tv Key Capitol Hill Hearings CSPAN August 18, 2015 9:00am-11:01am EDT
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they get the general direction candidate by the specific date and then when they have the one-on-one conversations for the social media with the terrorist overseas they've never met in person to give specific guidance on how to combat that attack. and the problem that we are starting to face in this arena is that the agencies will come to my office and be able to meet the predicate to get a court order. we will see that its probable cause. we will get the court order or can get a court order from the judge. so when you go to service on the company, they are technically incapable of processing the order that means we can't, law-enforcement - they know they are talking to a person inside of in sight of the united states but they can't see what they are saying. ..
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we are engaging in the two both justice department but also fbi and others to engage in talks constructively for these companies. the business models keep changing. this late expertise on have a technically work resides in the private hands. in some of these models one may be we are a business and we are
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building a platform for people to talk and share ideas into business. their business model is not we want to have that model used by terrorists to get people inside the tiny. that's not the point of the business model. when we talk to these companies now there's an awareness that same platform they used for good is been used to target the people on the platform. it's good business to make sure your platform a safe, i would hope come in addition to being good patriotic duty. we are seeing that shared commonality of interest. what you are seeing is increased investment in resources, both human resources in order to identify the terrorists on your site or targeting children are those who are targeting for sexual exploitation, and the use of algorithms and other technical tools. what we need to start encouraging is right now they develop the service, rush, curtis give, then they think
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about the problem of terrorists exploiting it. we will get better i hope together thinking about it for you scale up that this is going to be a problem for my business. >> let's bottom line the home grown threat a bit. james comey said this potential but it's a lot more of these attacks. how likely is that? the fbi has been pretty good about supporting them. >> the frequency is increasing them. -- thwarting. we've had around 12 additional arrests at the fbi is doing everything it can working with intel community and private community to get in front these attacks but bottom line is tactic of targeting the youth, targeting those who are mentally unstable, targeting them to commit attacks here at home
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which would require you to have a nice gun isn't a big -- a knife or gun. we've seen attacks in canada, australia, out of the uk, the terrible attacks across 30 british lives in tunisia we saw the attacks on "charlie hebdo" in france. until we figure out a way to crack this terrorist threat billion payout i think all of us are on edge, then we're going to see an attack like that here at home. we just had a tragic attack in tennessee, and my condolences go out to the families of those who lost their loved ones. >> can you say what he using an encrypted phone or an encryption to communicate? >> are not going to talk about that case specifically, but i will say of the variety of cases that we are seeing now, currently rehearsing that. >> caroline, what is the cia sing about whether isil things
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this is a useful strategy for them and it will continue? the analysis i've seen is at a stalemate right now. isil is not leaving their caliphate anytime soon under the current u.s. strategy. are we facing this threat for years to come? >> i think we're doing everything we can to mitigate against the threat and to get information we can get in terms of threat information for the purpose, within u.s. government like the fbi. i can myself as a lawyer predict how that struggle is going to end up. we are doing everything we can. >> stepping back from the homegrown threat, can you tell us, for years al-qaeda is not capable of mounting the kind of nine 9/11 style attack a longer it's been decimated. but how do know that isil is or some other offshoot, given the extent to which they're ensconced in the safe havens will be done a terrific intelligence, how are we so sure
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there's not a major homeland attack on the homeland likely? >> i would have to defer to the analysts on that when. what i do know is where sufficiently concerned about al-qaeda, al-qaeda in the arabian peninsula and isil to view themselves as being threatened by them in a severe sense to our national security, it is over an armed conflict with under the aumf, the 2001 authorization for military force. >> i would say bad whether, look, my division was formed after september 11, the first litigating division of the department of justice and figures that we were created in 2006. one of the core reasons for christian was the breakdown that had existed between law enforcement on the one hand and the intelligence community on the other. to be dedicated to ensuring that
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as large we have prosecutors come in colors, regulatory lawyers, policy lords sitting under one roof focus on national security threats and being driven on what the intelligence picture shows the threat is. in terms of what they're telling us the threat is, it remains, we remain concerned about al-qaeda conducting a large scale attack. we remain very concerned about safe havens and doing everything we can as a government through the authorities, whether it's covert action, military action, law enforcement or other sanctions to prevent safe havens in yemen or syria and iraq or libya, from preventing terrorist groups from having time and space to plot and plan large-scale spectacular attacks. at the same time in terms of the current threat from we've seen -- seen this change, in stead of a large-scale attack, plotting and planning overseas because
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they're encouraging people to do the attack at home. spirit do you agree with jim, and that is very close to al-qaeda as the top threat to the homeland of? >> first we defer to the fbi and intelligence community first. we are driven by their intel as to what the thread is. there is a clear and present danger here because, i mean, you are seeing in these cases in one instance someone with a knife trying to board a bus to commit an attack who was shot before he boards the bus. so we are seeing instances here now with the attacks have occurred, almost occurred or stopped at the last minute by law enforcement. we remain concerned, their children were killed with our military, law enforcement and intel partners to try to prevent the large-scale spectacular
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package of. >> both of you have been involved in beatings were your site off on the legality of very sensitive counterterrorism operations. you're telling, in the agency's lawyers group. both the defense secretary gates in another criticized what they called micromanagement operations from the white house. can you shed some light on how this process works and how these decisions go through the process of? >> the interagency lawyers group is something that is been in existence for many years. i've started going to meetings in the clinton administration, predicted that as well and have been going to this meetings, i've been in management for over 20 years. whichever agencies are both in to the topic at hand, the nsc, legal adviser and, legal adviser told the, legal adviser and pull the general counsels at both senior members other legal things together to talk about that particular issue. i've spent four years total at
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the nsc as i very much believe in the value of that process. the same way the nsc process of the deputies and principles level is an effective way of getting all the agencies were relevant together and to share their views and to come to us to come to office possible common understanding. that's usually the goal of the tennessee lawyers group process. each agency has its own perspective on what they think is legal, complies with international law. so the goal is to have everybody tried to come to a common understanding. i think that helps the agencies that those lawyers are advising to make sure they are all on the same page and legal degrees. this administration takes very seriously whether our actions are consistent with domestic and international law. that's something we're constantly evaluating. >> usl or could stop a proposed covert interaction and its tracks, right? it's an incredibly powerful role you play.
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>> yes. it true that i am the chief legal adviser to the agency and so if there were a covert action that if i was unlawful i would absolutely make my views known to the director and to do nothing he would be happy. >> as an outsider how he observed that the cia reacts to the lawyering your office conducts? forcing to live under these rules. >> that was one thing i was pleasantly surprised by because i had experience with the agency for years from my time at the justice department and the nsc and i knew the lawyers were terrific group of people whom i interacted but i did know how the operational components for example, would feel about their lawyers. i've almost a third of my lawyers are embedded with the operators. i think that really helps to foster a strong relationship from the ground up. and something is being planned the lord is right there, they
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understand what the goals are. if the original proposal is not something that can be consistent with law or regulation, that lawyer can say i can help you, if you do this other way, then that would be lawful. they have a very collaborative relationship and very much seek the views of the lawyers. i've received no complaints during my whole time about the quality of the legal advice they are getting are a concern if you like only i if those lawyers wod just be quieter than it do what i need to do to keep the country safe. they understand how important it is because of the need for legitimacy what we do with the american people. >> let's move to surveillance. one of the snow and revelations was the program in section seven of two, which gathers foreign intelligence information -- 702. as part of that there's a lot of and divert or incidental question of u.s. person information. the president appointed a task
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force which included mike morrell to look at all the citizens. some of the recommendations they were, if the just person information we obtained without warrants there should be new tougher rules on this stuff. shouldn't be able to use it against a person in a legal proceeding. shouldn't search u.s. persons made against them. you should purge it. those recommendations were basically tossed out. can you explain why? >> that was the view of that group but we have a competing view from the president, civil liberties oversight board. got up and running more recently which issued a report as an event, the executive branch about 702. they found a 72 collection is lawful, consistent with the fourth amendment. they knew about this and still collection issue. the fisa court is completely unaware of it.
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john can speak more to that to the specific habit but our rules about what you can do the information that is collected has been collected lawfully. we're talking policy concerned, the ability to search that information. >> lawfully but not with a probable cause warrant, right of? >> 702 is a different legal construct. >> the idea that section 70 wasn't revealed by any disclosure that it was something that was passed into law after vigorous and open debates by the congress in 18 the paradigm that only the united states card has adopted a think is right but its more restrictive than afford any other place in the world. when we did post search
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commission report they were terrible abuses revealed in the commission report. so, set up a review effective of all three branches of government. although adages met with some foreign counterpart, others are looking to talk to this. right now we are bound the only country that is three branches of government involved in what is traditionally very much private and executive, the collection of intelligence in defense of the country were national security purposes. what this regime was at its core was there's an oversight within the executive branch both by my lawyers, inspectors general, the general counsels of the intelligence community and other relevant agencies. bears than applications that have to take place between the same judges who sit in the day jobs, still working as the same judges at a publicly known to be sitting on the foreign intelligence surveillance court
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to review the legality of certain applications. of applications are overseen by the intelligence community and to our reckless laws in place that require disclosure of information to those intelligence community, committees so they can review what those applications are among the 50 actually applied, three branches. what you saw with section 70 was a statute that says communications have changed, and many communications now that our non-u.s. persons overseas, the same types the u.s. has been collecting for years will hit u.s. providers, so when you're doing collection you're serving the order on the united states provided that the reason you're serving it to target the non-u.s. person who's located overseas. when they had that debate one of the core reasons they adopted the program was to prevent another 9/11, prevent terrorist attacks, and what the operators,
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law enforcement, intelligence community are most concerned about are when they know there's a terrorist overseas who's in the recommendations with the u.s. person in the united states. so what the privacy and civil liberties oversight board found along with many others to examine this issue is that is very important, therefore, for the law enforcement or intelligence or the to go to search and find the information was targeted at the terrorist overseas and on person -- non-u.s. person overseas, but when they find there's a u.s. persons they want to find information. there's other restrictions including restrictions on youth. that program is being litigated in an adversarial manner in our court system, including in the mohammed mohammed case, an individual event convicted by his peers have attended to on a christmas tree lighting ceremony in portland and as part of the case there was a notice that there was fisa information indicates and the court has
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upheld the legality of the 7a program. it's not something that is occurring in sigir. the actual collection, the structures that are in place, largely because of an open to debate spent one more on counterterrorism and they will move to cyber. i've got to ask about a decade the cia and television program and the reporter i would ask the forward-looking question. john prater and seemed to leave the door open -- john brennan -- reinstitute, and some republican presidential candidates, rick perry, mr. young said they would bring back which some people believe to be tortured. could either of you see a scenario where you would sign off on the legality of enhanced interrogation techniques, how would you respond to president
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saying he wanted to do this would you resign? would you go along with it? what would you do? >> first of all i don't know if you're aware but there's been a minute i think to the ndaa by senator mccain and feinstein fen know what codified executive order that president president obama put in place we first got here, fla which is supported by the administration including the intelligence community spirit that would make it law. >> that a future president could not, could not. i think that would frankly be the best way forward. i don't anticipate being in a situation to which i would ask to sign off on eit's. >> and by implication you're suggesting you would not. >> yes. >> john, what is your view of? >> the executive order is currently prohibited. it's also i think would be something would go to caroline in the first instance the way we
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are set up. something the fbi chose not to adopt for fbi agents at the time spent let's talk about cyber. last year at this form you explain the genesis about and the fbi were reorient in itself to tackle the cyberthreat the that was pre-sony. we've had the sony attack. maybe you can when of the system works in that case. >> last year we talked about the fact that we were sitting on an unprecedented scale, and again going back to the mission of our division which is take with the intel issuing is about the threat and make sure as lawyers we adopt. what we were seeing was day in day out billions of dollars worth of data stored by u.s. companies are it was horrifying. we thought it's not sufficient to watch. we need to come up with ways to
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disrupt and change this activity. we have christiane here from intel and what we talked about was a need and then of his aggregate is to go on offense -- chris young -- defense alone is not going to change this battlefield. right now offense outstrips defense in terms of the billy, particularly a sophisticated nation-state actors. you get into systems. if someone tries to sell you a product, maybe some of you, hopefully not, ladies would like to sell you a product and their sales pitch is we can take your internet connected computers and make them safe from breach, we can build a wall that is high enough or deep enough to prevent a determined nation-state adversary from getting into your system, they are selling you the brooklyn bridge. it does not exist. when we are in that environment we are in the environment of risk mitigation, looking at other ways to address the threat. part of that is getting smarter
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and having whole system risk mitigation approaches defensively but part of it also has to be doing what we've done in every other area of threat which is telling adversary this is not costly. it may be new but it's not anonymous. you can't get away with this activity without paying a penalty. we knew just a getting better at increasing the penalties. we reorganized at the justice department to retrain hundreds of prosecutors across the field and in my division we restructured, have a deputy to focus on nothing but to make sure we came to the nation-state actor, when he came to terrorist groups, to the national security threat, that we weren't leaving the criminal justice system off the table the and we were not repeating some mistakes added in a pre-9/11 with the terrace which was law enforcement on the one hand and intel on the other. retrain those prosecutors. the fbi put out guidance that says thou shalt share what formally had been on the intel
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side with lawyers and that the national security division. using that new information is what led to the indictment of the five minutes of the people's liberation army unit 61398. we never thought that one indictment alone was going to change this problem but it was important to bring the criminal justice system back on the table. in part among other things to send a message that this is criminal when you go and steal from a private company, just like we did, back up a u-haul truck in to the seabiscuit we talk about a new approach that later, after that event, went to meet with a fortune 100 general counsel. we talked about some of the issues and we were telling them it's a risk mitigation issue. it needs to be at the level of your ceo and board what others are. this is a serious threat. what we found was those who are in sectors have been attacked like finance or defense got it.
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had constructive questions intended to working with us. others came up and said i'm not in industry, ma i'm not in defense, i meant something like entertainment and i don't see this ever happening to me last [laughter] post sony, i got a flood of calls and e-mails the same could you go back to what you were saying about the national security threat and what we're supposed to do? according to one report have been put on report in terms of what he is saying and the private sector and he said 90% of what he is saying on clients are nation-state advanced persistent threat institutions into systems. what you saw post sony ever talk about this hypothetically because we have not done it yet, last year at husband, and this is criminal justice system, we need to bring all tools like we do in the terrace arena to this thread.
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that means three things. one, we've got to get better at figuring out who did it. that means working with the victim, with fbi, with the intelligence community and getting a high confidence we know data. second effort to get who did it we can't be afraid to say who did it like we do in other areas are we will not be able to deter. and third won't have to do is out with who did the has to be a consequence. sony was a great partner in that. they came in to the fbi so we can work quickly to figure out who did it. when we figured out who did it and it was north korea, you saw the unprecedented step of having the fbi. there wasn't a charge but we announce today that it that it was north korea and how we knew it. then you saw the president issue sanctions against north korea and say official state public adobe something easy and something you don't see but there will be consequences to that was an important message not just a bad actor but other
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actors in order thinking how much can they get away with in this space. >> so who did opm and what are they going to do about it? >> so going post sony cannot an executive order in place that allows the use of sanctions for a broader set of actors, and we talked about the idea of designating certain entities under the commerce department regulations we can do business inside the united states. we need to continue to look across the full range as lawyers of our legal authorities to see what can we do, increase the cost, when we have high confidence that they did a specific intrusion. while i'm not going to talk about opm specifically, what i will say is i strongly believe in this approach and that we need to continue when we can to work to hold specific consequences and tell the actors
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here's where we are doing what we're doing it is because you did x, y or z and will be a consequence, there will be pain induced as a result. >> we are taught about the office of personnel management, millions of records and security clearance of data that was hacked and is being described as one of the worst counterintelligence laws in american history. incredibly sensitive information about people whose procured or in some cases didn't in some cases the intelligence work. can you talk about how big a blow this is been? >> i would want to add to what director comey said yesterday, the incredible amount of information. it's very alarming and is certainly is not, not for anybody who's assess 86 was compromised to have people know
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your relatives and all those things. all those kind of information. >> even if cia officers or not it is an impact -- database, cia is impacted. >> fantasy anybody would be impacted who's in the u.s. government spent it's been reported actors link to jon who are responsible for the. why isn't the u.s. can say that? >> no to do everything we can to hold this, from my point of view, pacific actors accountable to finally get it and build a picture, i'll defer to others but we need from my perspective in terms of using certain legal authorities we need both to get who did and they would look for either evidence or other information that we can publicly views with the right the first two of specific people accountable. sometimes, a hatred of thinking i thought that could be done and we starting to show it can be
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done. it's hard and we are new at applying this approach. it can be done and it will be done and we need to continue to work to do at spent moving of opm on the side the question in general. you talked about things you will not see. are the things the u.s. government is doing to disrupt cyber espionage against companies are other types of cyber attack, sort of sanctions? >> i'll go back to what has already publicly said which is there will be things you see and things you don't see but that there would be consequences. so that's an answer to your question. >> are we seeing any diminution in the level of attack? >> i think you are seeing changes as a result of these efforts, but i would say this. we as a country move incredibly quickly from 20, 25 years restoring 99% of what we found
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an analog space to 99% in digital space. we did so using a medium that was designed for free communication and not for security. that was billions and trillions of those with of investment to make that massive shift. we are playing a gang of catchup and w we're beyond both in a private and then protection of government services work offense is outstripping defense. vulnerable to criminals, spies and eventual it's going to be more and more vulnerable to terrorist who have already stated their intention to develop this capability and are playing better trying to develop the capability we're doing our best to slow the development down. i am not sanguine about where we are now, and among other things i call on congress to pass additional legislation to allow better information sharing within the private sector and with government. we both in government and in the
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private sector in working with ill need to do more faster to prevent catastrophic attacks from occurring. >> like john was describing what the changes either within his national security division, you may be aware we are engaged right now in the most historic reorganization modernization of the agency since 1947 when it was first created, and he was moving along in a very rapid pace and resulted from internal study and working group that came up with a variety of recommendations. one of th the most significant s figured out the agency can better deal with this rapid technological innovation. we stood up a new digital directorate of digital innovation. we had four directives, one for analysis, one for support, one for operations and before science and technology. this will be a single new directorate the wheel nut five which will integrate both our cyber defense side, our cio, as
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well as open source center as well as our efforts on the operational side to take advantage of opportunities in the cyber arena. we are hoping very much this will have significant benefits by integrating all those people together. it's quite a big effort within the agency. each of the of the four directors i meant to have the own career service which is meticulously brought to a certain incredibly high standard pics of the ideas also that same career service. the people are all incredibly talented is not a career single service and the digital innovation chain. so the idea is to create that. >> great. i'd like to throw it open for audience questions now. right here. i think we have to wait for the microphone.
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>> we are in an armed conflict with some the terrorist groups. would not that make it appropriate to use law of war targeting regime to go out at least some of the websites? secondly, if that isn't possible, what about using material support that you spelled it on the platform? thirdly, what about civil liability along the lines of the arab bank case from last summer? >> thoughts on that? >> i'll start all of it and then turn it over to caroline. we need to look at the full range of tools and trying to disrupt the way terrorist are currently trying to communicate, particularly individuals inside the united states. it's very fact specific over which two of would be best. right now, again the current
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model on the one that is causing us the most concern is using these platforms that are provided by u.s. mainly providers that are used by english-speaking shown as a place they think is safe. and adults. so when it comes to the use of those platforms, in every instance it's a violation of the terms of service, of the particular companies, precarious to be targeting these kids and encouraging them to take terrorist attacks. and so what yo you are saying there, the company can take action and they know systems the best. what they're doing now, and i do think it's been a more positive conversation as people become very aware of the threat that they're not just doing it for inside the united states to it or hearing it from australia,
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canada, the united kingdom, france, spain, other places where they want to do business and customers are using their services that you need to do more to help make these platforms safe. that's causing an increase of resources on the end and they know their systems best to try to prevent these messages from reaching vulnerable populations. we need to improve in that area. with material support, let's take on the far end of the sample, so there was somebody holding a camera as the decision was made to slowly behead an individual by a terrorist and killing for propaganda purposes your and some going to avoid in general hypotheticals. that is someone who is providing i believe that you support under the statue so they can identify that type of individual who is
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providing the support to designated terrorist groups, we can use our criminal authorities if we can identify and locate them. but we don't do is we wouldn't target speech under our first amendment. you have to look at the effects of particular circumstances. there's conduct that might lend itself to the criminal prosecution if someone is intentionally aiding the terrorist group. the third area think we talked about was civil liability and you're starting to see under existing causes of action that there may be civil suits depending on the particular company is a smaller, what they're promising its customers some responsible on behalf of the company if there is is exploiting their services. you just heard i think senator whitehouse call for more thought and conversation in this regard at the end of the day i hope we can all agree as government,
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private citizens and companies providing services that the status quo is unacceptable. we had a new technology. terrorist groups are taking advantage of it, and we need to work together to make sure they don't cost innocent lives. if we can't do that under existing authorities, there's going to be more and more of a discussion about what additional authorities do you need. >> i was as a molecular cell group to go to the first part of your question, i think the law of warfare done is the right paradigm. which took is applying those in a relatively new area and what is an act of war is a very hard question to answer when you and the cyber realm. and one thing, remember how you would feel if this were applied to you, u.s. government. just be careful we take that into consideration. >> in the classes in the blue.
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>> joe from santa clara county, california. the panel of reference the opm hack and comment was made we all have to be mindful of the fact that digital assets can be sold by i think the phrase was criminal spies and terrorists. should we be concerned about a pack of the nsa both telephone records that have been acquired over the years? those are telephone records that indicate to whom we've all been talking and for what periods of time. is that information at risk? >> so i will, that's 310 million of us are supposed to be 21, 22 million federal employees and applicants. >> that are unclassified systems whether our internet connected systems that are designed to be connected to the world wide web. those are incredibly, they are
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vulnerable and a determined adversary can get into those systems. wouldn't say the same thing about how secret the systems are systems that enclave to be protected from internet. but this is record that nsa was collecting under the bulk telepathy metadata program which were kept in the repository which can only be queried when you reasonable suspicion and which under the freedom at moving away from a different system within stored at the provider are businesses that are already kept and exist at the companies under that particular regime. so they are concerned, to the extent of the digitally stored by whoever you choose, your provider or whether you're broadband service via telephone service, if those are in unclassified internet system, regardless what this program ever existed or not, they can be targeted i in adversary. so it isn't everywhere like
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other records would definitely encourage them to be concerned about cybersecurity and think about how their mitigating that risk. that's true of telephone business records but also true of what you may consider more sensitive records or equally sensitive like health and insurance records. or your business transaction record when you're doing your credit card purchases or your financial records. many of those are actually held in unclassified internet protected systems and that's where we are playing this gang of catch-up what i do think there's been a sea change in terms of awareness, intention, concern and resources by ceos, boards, directors, general counsels and into government. but that's relatively recent and we are still in catch-up mode.
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>> josh? >> thank you very much. josh rogin. you've noted in the past there's been upkick and the rest special by the fbi of a suspected global terrorists, people that previously the government had been keeping under surveillance but given the rising threat and rising, changing trends are now being picked up off of the virtual -- if you pick this is indictments and legal documents what josie is instances where these suspects talk to people they believed to be related to a terrorist group. what this suggests is the u.s. law enforcement, intelligence queen has people in these arenas, in these chat rooms, in these spaces posing as a terrorist talking to the people and that evidence is being used in these cases. what are the legal implications of that? do you ever wonder if maybe we are creating terrorists by drunken into these conversations? what line does this team becomes
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entrapment, stuff like that? thank you. >> the use of undercover operation by the fbi and law enforcement engine has long been established in u.s. law with the technique i use what i was doing my products cases or homicide cases and other cases i prosecuted prior to switching to the national security field. it is a vitally important tool in confronting this particular threat. and that is because we have identified the nature of the threat. if we can't get people into the forums whether having the discussion and deter people from getting into conversation because they're not sure if it actually reached a terrorist they want to reach or a law enforcement agent, that is the way we've been able to disrupt many of these plots. is critical to our whole change in approach of 9/11 of success as i successfully prosecuting a case after people have been killed.
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that's important, but success at preventing a terrorist attacks from occurring. and under u.s. law we don't prosecute people for talking the talk to her prosecute people for walking the walk. in order to do that you need to put into the test to see whether they can cook take that over step enforcement of the criminal act that they want to commit. i think you will see that tactic and meeting with my counterparts, interior ministers and justice ministers from across the world at the united nations last year and this year we'll have anniversary of the passage of united nations resolution 2170 which is an unprecedented unanimous -- people were green and nothing else. people agreed on the importance. one of the best practices that was discussed with our counterparts in this article global counterterrorism forum with over 70 conscious is how can i put on the books undercover operations? it is important those undercover
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operations are there to figure out who the real terrorist is, who actually kills people to join the foreign terrorist group, versus those who are just talking and thinking i think it is signed of the carefulness with the fbi has been applied that important tool, and hundreds and hundreds of terrorism cases that we prosecuted, not once has a defendant be able to successfully employ the entrapment defense, which is a defense under u.s. law. >> i think we have to wrap it up to the think you both very much, and thanks for listening. [applause] [inaudible conversations] >> this month marks the 10th anniversary of hurricane katrina which the gulf and east coast in late august. forcing more than one than people from homes and taking more than 1800 lives.
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later on c-span new orleans mayor talk to hurricane katrina and its aftermath. he served as lieutenant governor of louisiana during katrina. live coverage is at 1 p.m. eastern from the national press club. >> file the c-span cities to her as we travel outside the washington beltway to communities across america. >> the idea giunta cities to is to take a programming for our american history tv and booktv out on the road beyond the beltway to produce pieces that are more visual, that provide again a window into the cities that viewers would not, go to thathe also really rich historis and a rich literary scene as well. >> people have heard a history of the big cities like new york and l.a., chicago. but what about the smaller ones like albany? what's the history of that
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spirit we bend over 75 cities. one of the 95 cities in april of 2016. >> most of our program and c-span is event coverage. these are not event coverage types of pieces but they are shorter, to take you someplace come to a home, a historic site. >> we partner with a cable at the to to explore the history of the cities. >> the key energy into the city is the cable operator who then contacts the city. in essence into the cable industry bringing us a better. >> looking for great characters. you really want your viewers to get identified with these people that we are talking about speed and it's an experience we'll take a program where we are taking people on the road to places where they can touch things, see things and warned about, not just the local history because a lot of the local history plays into a national story. >> if the sum is washington is it should be enticing enough
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that they can get the idea of the story but also feel as if this is just in our backyard, let's go see it. >> we want the viewers to get a sense i know that place just am watching one of our pieces. >> the c-span mission as a do it all of our coverage believes, leads into we get out on the road. >> you got to make it a message about this network in order to do this job. it's done the one thing that we wanted it to do, which is build relationships with the city and our cable partners, and gathered some great programming for american history tv and booktv. booktv. >> watch this easter on the c-span networks to see where we're going next, see our schedule at c-span.org/city stewart. >> congress will debate governor greg when he returns from its summer recess. next a panelist at the sanctions portion of the iran nuclear
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agreement and debates the possible consequences if iran violates the due. this event hosted by the center for strategic and international studies. >> good afternoon, ladies and gentlemen. please. we have a somewhat unusual format this afternoon, because any city where this issue has been filled with debates, what we are attempting to do is bring you three of the experts who helped draft and negotiate these agreements, and give you the opportunity to ask the most challenging questions you can. now, let me emphasize the word
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question. if you look around you'll see that this is probably one of the worst formats to make a long speech in the of the questions imaginable. i used to tell my students when i was teaching, if you couldn't ask the question well in three sentences, you not only shouldn't get a degree, you probably shouldn't get a job. [laughter] and beyond that i don't want to put any limits at all. i think the issue here is you have three leading experts, colin powell was one of the key negotiators, has a very wide background -- colin powell, within the office of the sex a defense as well as background in teaching. you have jon wolfsthal whose greatest achievement was to be here at csis, but also as the deputy director of the morten center for nonproliferation
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studies and has played a key role in arms control at the national security council. and chris bachemeyer who has the enviable job of being a deputy coordinator for sanctions policy, which has to be probably one of the most challenged jobs in the city. i'm going to basically simply start asking a few questions, give you the opportunity to formulate the questions you would like to ask. i know a few of you. i do not like any names know all of use i'm going to have to call upon you by row and position. went idea i would appreciate it if you'd give me perhaps just your name and affiliation, and then just move on to the question. so let me begin, gentlemen, but asking you to questions about the way this debate has unfolded
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and what to me seems to be problems it has not addressed. one, it has focused on the idea you combine the future, 10, 15, or many years in advance, rather than start an arms control process were the strategic condition will change, you have to renegotiate and adapt with time. and what is the capability to do that? the other, and to me perhaps the most damaging aspect of this debate, is to focus on how quickly you can get one crude kind of ice that you haven't tested in terms of fissile material, rather than how it will affect iran's ability to develop a meaningful nuclear force, and a meaningful military capability so let me begin and i will start looking around for people who have questions.
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>> tony, thanks. thanks to all of you for coming out on a lovely day. as my students at georgetown would say, can we have class outside, which at least my experience was and we played frisbee instead of going to class? in any case thank you all for having us here to talk with this important issue. i should put one biographical clarification, which is i was not one of the poor souls like chris who lived in vienna for weeks and months at a time in vienna and geneva and other places negotiating the deal on the front lines. people like john and i had the harder task of negotiating a deal back here in washington. i just wanted to make that cle clear. secretary and secretary bunnies and wendy sherman and others and people like chris deserve all the credit for i think is a very strong agreement -- secretary moniz. asking whether this is the
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final, whether they. at the end of the sentence as relates to this issue, the final long-term answer to all of the controversy with iran, it's not. if the agreement to sell puts in place a series of very important long-standing amendments for iran that we believe will give the international community confidence that they will not develop a nuclear weapon. it puts constraints on their enrichment vast over the next 15 years, puts permanent constraints on the arak have the water reactor as a source of plutonium for a weapon. it puts permanent obligations on iran as relates to interest of inspection and generational commitment on certain types of inspections that are frankly unprecedented like inspection to do uranium mines and mills and electric there's a whole series of long-term commitments in this deal that would not exist in the absence of this deal. it is a true that there are
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inevitably going to be issues and controversies within the four corners of the deal whether even with the document that is more than 100 pages long and is extraordinarily detailed and precise, there will be disputes, disagreements. people may find ambiguities. one of the good innovations about this deal this is a mechanism for addressing that in the form of the joint commission which is basically modeled after the joint commission we have with existing interim nuclear agreement, the jpoa, joint plan of action. it is a mechanism for working through the issues. i give you a really brief example. several months ago there was a question under the existing interim nuclear agreement about whether the arenas introducing into an advanced centrifuge, the ir-5, was a technical violation of the agreement or not. the reality was that in this particular instance the text of the jpoa was unclear but when the iaea pointed out that are
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mandated it is cast into the ir 50 centrifuge we raised it as a strong objection to sing it was inconsistent with obligations and limitations on centrifuge r&d under the jpoa. the rest of the p5+1 the great and iran stopped. that was an example of something that wasn't completed settled in the text of the che. i got put back in the box as a consequence of this mechanism and there will undoubtedly be things like that moving forward. have also been issued outside the four corners of the deal. the reality is that this deal was never intended to solve every problem that we have with iran or every problem that we have in the middle east. and that there will continue to be conflict of interest in some places animosities. and other places perhaps opportunities for more constructive engagement as it relates to a whole host of regional issues. that this deal does address at all because it's a nuclear deal. it's not a grand bargain with tehran. so undoubtedly we will have to
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address those issues, and we're committed to doing so. the only thing i would say on the second question, which is that the deal focuses on what you called the rush to one gun type device. i would say for those of you who are following this less technically, there's been a lot instances in the public discourse on the deal, on the notion of breakout. we define break it in a very small c. conservative way. that is, the time it would take from a political decision to do so for iran to produce the first bombs worth of fissile material. most of the break of discussion is focused on a green impact because given iran's turn uranium capacity that would be the fastest route for them to develop the explosive fuels, explosive material for the first nuclear weapon. acid curly stands, iran's breakout timeline for weapons grade uranium is two to three
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months. is the supreme leader woke up tomorrow and decide to go for a bomb it would take 60-90 days for iran to develop the first bombs worth of material. under this deal because it reduces such a vision by two-thirds of the stockpile of low-enriched uranium by 90%, for the next decade or more to breakout timeline, the cushion would be at least a year, and beyond your 10th of the deal for a number of years after that we expect to breakout timeline to be meaningful greater than it is today. industries or other aspects of designing a weapon. just because you're the nuclear fuel doesn't mean you have a sophisticated implosion warhead that could fit onto tip of a missile. there's research and evolved as going to the. one of the in the -- innovations because got the framework we reached in april in lausanne, for the first time a lock the first time it locked iran it faces a commitment to restrict the ability research and development.
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very consequentially, for example, have a 15 year ban on doing any research related to uranium, plutonium metallurgy which is hugely important they're ever going to design a nuclear warhead. they are other dual use kinds of research, high speed, use of high speed cameras, work on certain types of trick devices, et cetera, many of which are activities iran allegedly engaged in in the past before 2003 that are explicitly forbidden in this deal from doing forever. it is true that this deal does not, does not address specifically the very large arsenal of ballistic missiles that iran has. iran has the largest number of short and medium-range ballistic missiles of any country in the region, and, obviously, what this deal does address is deal with the problem of putting a nuclear warhead on that missile by preventing them from getting the fissile material and limiting their r&d under weaponization peace of the
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missile issue itself will continue to be something that we are going to have to work through. we have eight more years of restriction of the u.n. security council and on ballistic missiles with other international agreements and sanctions was and other efforts like the proliferation security initiative to go after this issue. we have ballistic missile defense work and we are doing on our own and with our partners in the gcc and with israel. that's an issue we're committed to continue getting after, but again i think it's one of those that falls in some sense outside the four corners because while these could be delivered he goes for a nuclear weapon in the three, they are also pleased from iran's point is central to the conventional deterrent. to have a nuclear relationship but they are not solely a nuclear related activity. but i don't know if chris or john want to pile on any of that before we open it up to others? i haven't screwed up too much so far?
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>> i think this gentleman on the third row. would you wait for the microphone? >> i'm with the atlantic council him and i will tell you i've been just a social occasions by john kerry for referring to the screen as it is i will defer to his terminology. i support the agreement but have several concerns. first, i don't see that the white house has set the stage anything but an ad hoc strategy to market and support the deal dirk. ....
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the president has probably done more interviews on this topic more than any other issue in recent memory of the venues for that have been all over the place. you, we, op-eds, testimony and then all of us, from the president to the vice president to the secretaries of state, energy, treshry, and all of us minute minions below that, i'm spending almost every day on the phone with members of congress going up to the hill providing briefings for members of congress and staff.
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no question it may appear ad hoc on the outside. actually we have a plan. it is adapting as circumstances and sentiments are adapting but we're pretty focused on this even though it's august. in terms of our long-term strategy for the region i think you can think of it in terms of different buckets, all right? this deal is about the nuclear issue. putting that issue aside for a moment we are still, we still have all sorts of challenges in the region. many of them are related to iran and its destablizing activities in places like syria, lebanon and iraq and yemen and bahrain and elsewhere. we're going to have to continue to contend with that. we, obviously have number of challenges in the region to include the so-called islamic state, and isil and- we have a collision of more than
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60 countries. it is instructive to note when the president announced lausanne framework, he would have leaders of gulf countries to come to camp david to have this conversation. the fact we're working closely with the gulf states to build up what we call the regional security architecture is not new but the president did feel like it was time to re-energize some aspects of that and to build off of the work we'd already done with the gulf states to expand out to address some of their specific concerns as it relates to iran. now the gulf states already have, you know, an extraordinary quantity of sophisticated military conventional armaments. there is a sense that iran is this unstoppable juggernaut in the region and that iran with a little more money will take over the entire globe. it is, i think instructive to keep in mind last year iran
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spent $15 billion on its defense and gcc combined spent $115 billion on its defense. saudis alone spent more than $80 billion on their defense the challenge -- so that is eight or nine times as much as iran if you put the gcc together. the challenge is not whether there are sophisticated aircraft u.a.e. flies most sophisticated f1s in the world. saudis have most sophisticated f-15s or ballistic missiles defense or other forms of conventional defense. where more can be done to building up capabilities to go after the challenges that iran poses. cyberdefenses. protection for critical structure. the freedom to conduct freedom of navigation and maritime interdiction. the expansion of sharing of intelligence. trading -- training their special operations forces to be more expeditionary. these are all areas of major
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emphasis coming out of camp david. of course we have relationship with israel which is politically tense at times. no question about that. again as the guy who used to have israel in his portfolio at the dod there has never been administration done more from defense perspective or intelligence perspective than this administration has done with israel measured quantitatively or qualitativelily. we do protect i will's' qualitative edge, providing joint strike fighter, missile defense, iron dome, sling, arrow, et cetera. the presence of our aegis cruisers in the eastern mediterranean to protect missiles coming from iran or anywhere else in the region. we also want to take that to the next level as it relates to iran regular activities in the region. i will say something. this is a complicated time to have that conversation because as the president made clear and other folks have made clear we
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understand the prime minister netanyahu is not a fan of this deal. we try to make the case you're not a fan of this deal but we have all other issues to deal with including iran and we're ready to roll up our sleeves and deal with them to get to work with them on those issues partly the iran issue. the israeli leadership is not keen to take us up on the offer. it sends mixed messages. if they're working with iran on one space and working against us on another that we're a little political constrained. i hope we get beyond the congressional review period that those constraints fall to the wayside. >> gentleman in the third row here had his hand up first. colin got two questions for the price of one. >> i know this guy. old friend of mine. >> one question for the price of one. >> i'm job seib with the policy
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resolution group. i have process related question related to the deal. if we get to implementation day do you anticipate it takes more congressional action to unwind statutory questions like seceda or your view executive action alone could largely get us to withdrawal of secondary sanctions under the deal? >> i will ask chris to take that. >> that is a good question and actually one that we really tangled with as we worked out the negotiations and as we ultimately decided how we will do this. the sanctions relief is set up in a couple of phases. the first phase you're referring to implementation day is the phase that happens after iran completes all the major nuclear steps. the steps that push the breakout timeline to a year. cut centrifuges to a third and tock spiel to a one-third the percentage what it was. once we get all that we would take steps what we call suspend the sanctions.
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it is application of. there are all sorts of things you could call it. what we're doing is using the president's statutory waiver authority to waive sanctions agreed to be lifted in this context. now the second step, we're all referring to u.s. sanctions in this context. the second step to that would be when we were actually terminate those sanctions. that step that occurs at eight years down the road. eight years or when the iaea reaches its broader conclusion says there are no more undeclared nuclear activities in iran. something we suspect will take that long but that is cornerstone or the milestone we're looking for. so that is the point where we would seek congressional action to actually terminate those sanctions. it was intentionally constructed this way because we know that congress, we can not tell congress what to do with respect to this they have their own prerogatives to make that decision. we will seek that legislation. the administration at times will do its best to seek that legislation but it's not,
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obviously not a foregone conclusion. so those are the two steps. the e.u. and u.n. are largely similar. the e.u. is using its own mechanisms to ostensibly suspend that in the first stage. these are the kind of economic sanctions they have in place. the u.n. is slightly different in the sense that the u.n. structure actually terminates old resolutions but it re-establishes the most important sanctions that we want to keep in place for the long term. those are the ones that relate to missile technologies. those ones relate to transfers of conventional weapons. those relate to transfers of nuclear technology. obviously core elements of this agreement. >> only thing i would clarify for those of you who aren't in the weeds on it is implementation day as chris indicated is conditions-based but there is question well, how soon is that? the answer is really in iran's court. there are technical and political issues they're growing to have to sort their way through. we think, we estimate it will take them six to 12 months to fulfill these basic obligations
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of disables the reactor, reducing centrifuges by 2/3, stockpile by 98%, implementing additional protocal, access issues on possible military dimensions, et cetera. we take it will take six to 12 months. when exactly implementation will be will just be a little tbd. >> jim makes a good point this is entirely intentional to have big for big strategy. the most important thing for us in our interest for iran to get done everything it needs to as fast as possible. people said, why don't you string out, drip, drip sanctions along the way? we want a big incentive. we didn't want to do anything before iran done iting steps or signing bonus or drip, drip, drip. there is one big suspension that iran needs to do to satisfy u.s. interests. >> there was a gentleman in the back there. i don't know if you still have the question. >> thank you. richard fieldhouse, former armed
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services committee staffer. good to see you all again. and my question is, if you would address your view on the consequences if congress were to reject the agreement, specifically looking at whether we could simply negotiate another deal. whether iran would be able to continue its previous level of nuclear programmatics enrichment, reactors, all that. also in terms of whether the existing sanctions are likely to remain in place and enforced. thank you. >> so let me take a met at that cut at that and see if chris wants to pile on some of the specifics as it relates to the sanctions. i think we all have to be somewhat humble that none of us can predict with 100% accuracy if congress blows up the deal. the only thing that is certain is uncertainty. the situation will be more uncertain, more messy, we will have less control, less leadership and international community will be less united. i think we can be certain of all
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those things but you can game out lots of different scenarios how this would play out. let me give you two ones that i think are most likely. one is we effectively reject the deal the united states does after agreeing agreeing with ird five other countries. this remember, isn't a deal between us and iran. this is seven-party deal. this becomes the final piece of evidence that hard-liners in iran need to basically discredit president rouhani and zarif. they have already sharpened their knives for them. and they pushed the leader, the supreme leader to use this to do what iran has done last two times diplomacy collapsed n 2005 when iran was negotiating with what was then called the e-3 and in 2009, 2010, tehran research reactor deal fell apart. what the leader decided to do those two times, double down on resistance and increase their nuclear program. because it emboldened
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hard-liners. so iran's program went up. from their perspective this can serve objective driving towards a nuclear weapon or generating leverage against us by increasing their nuclear capabilities. i think it is highly likely in the politics of iran that a congressional rejection leads effectively for iran to walk away from its commitments, not only ones under this deal but ones they currently have under the jpoa remember, if they start doing things like reaaccumulating with 20% enriched-uranium, sometimes called medium enriched-uranium even though technically is no such thing. turning on centrifuges they have installed at natanz, they could go from the break out time of 60 to 90 days to a month or less in relatively short period of time and it is very difficult to imagine that we would be able to hold together the international coalition we have isolates iran
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even in this circumstance where iran is creeping towards a nuclear weapon. the reason is, moist of the companies that signed up for sanctions regime sign the up for fixed period of time. that there is pot of gold at etched rainbow. we would lift sanctions and iran is back in business. oil hungry consumers in asia or banks and businesses in europe. some of those countries may stay on side to comply with existing sanctions but some of them won't at the very least the international community will be less united and the sanctions regime will be weaker. so iran will be driving closer towards a nuclear bomb and international community will be more fractured and sanctions regime will be somewhat weaker. that is a very dangerous scenario because it suggests to me that you're going to approach a decision point for the use of military force before you could ever recobble back together international coalition to get back to the bargaining table especially in the world where
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moderates and pragmatists in iran are discredited. after all we saw what happened when folks like jalili at the table versus folks like zarif is at table. iran is not monolithic place. their internal politics matter. second scenario is iran blows -- congress blows up the deal and iran sticks with the deal. this is also nightmare scenario but slightly different version. americans are out of compliance but we'll live our obligations going up to implementation today as long as europeans, russians, chinese, et cetera, lift the sanctions. this puts our allies in a horrible dilemma. because they either need to live up to their obligations under agreement because iran is living up to its obligations to lift sanctions and risks getting secondary u.s. sanctions or they keep the sanctions in place and they are in violation of the deal, right?
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and i think china and others are going to have, frankly a less complicated decision calculus. you know, countries like china, india, south korea, japan, taiwan, turkey, remaining customers for iranian oil it's a big economic hit for them not to do business with iran. and there are all sorts of ways you can imagine other countries, if they, if they believe iran was in compliance and we were out of compliance doing things to circumvent our secondary sanctions. they could set up bad banks to do business with iran that aren't connected to our financial system or transact through our central banks and dare us to start trade wars with the most important economies on planet earth. those six customers for iranian oil i mentioned currently control 47% of u.s. foreign-owned treasurys. half our foreign-owned debt, right? what allows sanctions regime is
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to operate not just coercive influence power u.s. economy, size of our economy, ability for to us force banks and companies make choices between doing business with iran or united states but underlying political consensus associated with that. because most of the time we don't have to sanction banks and companies to get them to comply because the political leadership in these countries agree with the objectives. once that political consensus goes away we're in real trouble of blowing up iran deal unraveling the sanctions regime. imagine you believe, we make this argument a lot, secretary kerry made this argument aa lot, secretary lew and others imagine you believe that is hyperbole, that the sanctions regime will not collapse. i think which all admit it will get a little waker relative to what it is today. this is big audience. are there a bunch of people that believe the sanctions regime will stay exactly the same,
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raise your hand if is stays the same exactly if congress walks away. okay. let's imagine only 10% weaker. imagine only 10% weaker than it is today? riddle me this, batman, how do you get a better deal with less leverage? you can't get a better deal with less leverage in international support. it is like, defies the laws of gravity. so the notion that congress can walk away from this deal, blow it up, will keep the international community together, we can ramp up pressure and drive iran back to the bargaining table for a better deal is a fantasy. you can't get more with less and we'll have less if congress blows up deal. last data point, i'm sorry, this is really important thing. i think one of the things american officials encounter when we travel the world, given sense of dysfunction and partisanship in this town is question whether we can govern. i think there is a, there is going to be real collateral
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damage for our business to do business in other areas with other types of agreements if agreement has support not only of u.s. president but of pretty much every other major power in the world. and vast majority of the other countries period, that congress just blows that up, i think it is harder for us to just do business, to have credibility and to lead on whole host of other issues. that's problem too. i don't know if there is anything sanctions related i goofed up. >> i can't follow that. that was perfect. >> before i move on i'm going to have to also caution potential questioners not to give panelists an opportunity to make a speech. [laughter] but seriously -- >> i thought we didn't want to do any remarks at the outset? >> i do have a fairly large list of hands already. so i'm going to come back and recognize people when i get through the group i already have. but there is a gentleman in the front here who had a question and if you wait for the mic,
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please. it was this gentleman here first, i'm sorry. >> thank you. my name is -- [inaudible]. i'm a russian here in washington d.c. i'm with tass thank you for doing the panel. i want to follow up on what the you just said about the importance. actually secretary of state was also speaking the other day in new york on difficulty and importance of keeping the team together. basically he said, if we walk away from iran, people start walking away from ukraine. so my question to you is, what are you doing what are you doing to keep the team together? i'm especially thinking about russia which is epseparate case and difficult case. >> we have to focus on the question. >> are you looking forward to
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unraveling sanctions against russia, how do you see it happening? thank you. >> yeah. so chris, if you want, i can take a geopolitical cut or -- i think geopolitical answer is we don't know but it is true that as we apply sanctions in a lot of different areas, that a lot of times the way we do it doesn't make other countries all that pleased with us. not just country west he target sanctions against but frankly our allies and coalition we formed go along on these sanctions because there are real costs associated with this. i think there is, one of the things i worry about, chris actually has to do this on a daily basis, one of the things i worry about if congress blows up this deal and we try to keep the sanctions regime together by simply threatening everybody in the world, it will not only undermined political consensus as it relates to iran policy but it will feed the anxiety concerns, tensions, that
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undergird our sanctions policy in general, which will make a whole host of national security priorities more difficult to execute. you have to do this on regular basis. >> i think that is exactly right. with respect to how this impacts our sanctions policy with respect to russia, these are separate policies. we've been able to demonstrate throughout this process while we have concerns in one area we're able to work closely with russia on the particular core issue we have. we think coming out of this, we think we had successful outcome we're working not only on our own sanctions but working ultimately to remove the sanctions at u.n. security council we and russia must agree on both timing and when those things will happen. and so these are, you know, this is separate policy issue from that. i think generally speaking it is instructive how you can use thighs sorts of things as a tool to ultimately get to a diplomatic outcome. >> so we had a gentleman with a question in the far back who
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raised his hand early on. can i -- let's see. we may have lost the immediate interest. pass on to the gentleman in the second row thank you. >> i'm a command surgeon out of 352nd civil affair out of fort meade. i want to ask you a question, different kind of question. who wants this deal? do iranians want this deal psychologically and culturally? is this for internal use or do we want this deal more? just hearing you gentleman, whether congress approves it or not is not going to make any difference. why are we pushing for the deal? are iranians pushing for it? >> well, i mean, not to be glib i think answer is we both want the deal probably for different reasons. we want the deal because one of the most significant challenges to international security and not just in this administration but in the previous
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administrations is the prospect of a nuclear-armed iran. because as troublesome as iran as actor and ambitious as regional agenda sometimes is, it would be put on steroids in a world where they had nuclear weapons. and so, with the exceptions of the wars in afghanistan and iraq, i would say the iran issue has probably been the issue the president focused on more since day one because of recognition of that problem. but he is also, he is consistently has said all options are on table to deal with. this is vital threat to u.s. national interest that iran will be not allowed to get a nuclear weapon. that is the policy of the united states. this deal sub stant eights more deeply from iran's point of view but the president has been equally clear, all else being equal a diplomatic solution is better. it is better, more sustainable and more enduring and doesn't accrue the cost of another war in the middle east. with all unpredictable
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consequences. even with the perspective pushing back their program, hard to imagine a military strike that destroys 98% of the their stockpile and disables 2/3 of their centrifuges, all of the rest. you will not get 10 or 15 years. you would be lucky if you got five years out of it. so we have an interest in resolving this issue and if possible doing it diplomatically. i think our allies share interest and also our partners -- folks we partner with in the p5 plus one with the russians we disagree with whole host of issues like ukraine and elsewhere also share that interest. i think iranian interest is different. iranians are obviously very vested in their nuclear program. think invested 100 to $200 billion to develop nuclear civilian infrastructure much which has dual-use capabilities. they have invested tremendous amount of regime's legitimacy, pride and national identity in this issue. something most americans don't
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get frankly degree which nuclear issue is wrapped up in iranian nationalism things like that. the notion of driving iran to zero out it is nuclear program already was probably always a fantasy because of how much the regime invested in it. the regime had interest in maintaining nuclear program even if for symbolic and civilian purposes. but they also had interest in getting sanctions lifted. lessened and eventually lifted over time because the sanctions have had a crippling effect on the iranian economy. iranian economy is probably 15 or 20% smaller than it would have been sanctions been imposed last few years not been imposed. that is challenge to iranian people. even though iran is not democracy, rouhani got elected on a campaign to break iran's isolation, to get the economy going again. in the aftermath of 2009 elections in iran the supreme leader was sensitive to the
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political costs ignoring that the fact that the public wanted this. i think the deal is in the interests of both parties but for different, for different reasons. which is why you don't have to trust them and they don't have to trust us. you just have to make a calculation about whether it continues to be in the interest of the two parties to comply with it. >> there were a couple of questions here in the front row early on. let me begin with the gentleman and then the lady. could we, thank you. >> yes, i'm ruses sell king, retired federal employee. islam is -- iran is islamic state with islamic constitution and the deceiving non-muslim but also have relationships with russia and china and japan and those countries have also psychological deception techniques, communists and east asians. i'm wondering what particular technique the leaders of iran are using to deceive us? are they using those techniques
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or just find a way of no way and doctrine of no doctrine, saying if the shoe fits, wear it? >> yeah. you know, i will leave it to academics to debate whether cultural essentialism makes sense or not as a explanation in these types of issues. i would say that. broader issue is not whether this is somehow imbued in something of dna of islamic republic but just empirical fact of the matter which iran has engaged in a lot of secret nuclear activities over the years. all the iconic nuclear facilities, natanz, fordow, these were all once covert facilities. we don't trust all else being equal the iranians won't do things in secret because they have done things in secret before which is why the president emphasized this deal is not about trust. it is about verification. why we believe there has never been an agreement in history of arms control or
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non-proliferation, a negotiated agreement that had more intrusive inspections of nuclear programs than the one we got here. it is not only 24/7 coverage of known nuclear facilities, fordow, natanz, those facilities but access to iruranium miles and century fueling production and enrichment facilities. those that want to know why that matters, if you want to build another secret enrichment site five years from now, it is not about drilling a hole in ground. tough fill it with centrifuges and scientists and uranium, natural source, yellowcake, you have to convert that to gas. what deal does, no other deal of its type has in the past create surveillance across entire supply chain which makes it effectively inconceivable that iran could divert large amount of materials from known facility sos secret facilities. then because iran will have apply additional protocol which allow as time-bound procedure for getting iaea access into
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suspicious facilities which is also unprecedented, countries have additional protocol elsewhere don't have such a procedure, we have confidence that if you haven't blocked them as they march down the field, you have some significant goal line defense as well as you, because you can get into suspicious sites. if they don't let us in, we can snap sanctions back and take other actions because they will be in violation of deal. all of that is to say, one of the great ironies or paradoxes of iran debate in this town so. criticism is focused on transparency and verification mechanisms when i think the non-proliferations and arms control experts who look at this believe that is strongest part of the deal. and we agree with that assessment. >> the lady in the second row. >> hi, i work for the bbc i wonder if you can tell us more about the marketing plan you came up with, i wonder what you found was most hard argument to overcome or most surprising or
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you thought they have a point in washington? i would love to hear from john and chris too on this. >> yeah, right. i don't blame you. i think, look, i think hardest argument to overcome in general is that iran is not a good regime. so why would you make a, were would you make a deal with a bad actor? and i think that argument is completely understandable. it is understandable when members of congress make it. it is understandable when the israelis make it. after all iranians regularly make abhorrent statements about israel. they make threatening statement. support a bunch actors that do our allies in the region, israel, others a great deal of harm and threaten us. they're not a good regime. we spent entire cold war period, since the 1970s making arms control agreement after arms control agreement with an entity that ronald reagan called the evil empire because we recognized that you could, reducing the risk of nuclear war
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was such an important priority that you could strike deals to reduce that risk in the arms control domain while still pushing back against the other things that the soviet union did all over the world like subverting our allies and supporting proxies and supporting terrorism and killing american forces all over the world. so we walked and chewed gum during the cold war. we can do the same thing here. i think notion why would you cut a deal with bad regime is kind of, understandable reaction that we've had to push back against. john, i don't know if you want to add, you've been involved in public outreach as much or even more than i have. >> i was starting to feel a bit like dr. carson at republican debate. [laughter] for my, i think, i won't say it is most surprising but i think it has been the most difficult argument. this is a complex technical agreement and relies on a certain assumption of knowledge, to explain to people who have
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not dealt at all with the international atomic energy agency why safeguards of confidentiality is important, why the united states has championed that principle for a decades, because we don't want to reveal proliferation sensitive information about u.s. facilities where we have confidential agreements. that the israelis have confidential agreements they want to keep confidential with the iaia. that has been a real challenge. this debate in part is political debate, we recognize people are trying to posture themselves, to say, well, there are these side deals we haven't been able to see because they don't have a familiarity with the iaea and work they do, has led to questions, how do we know we can trust these guys? there is nuclear power in 45 plus countries around the world because the iaea has been demonstrating their job for over 60 years. these guys got it right in iraq said there was no ongoing nuclear weapons program.
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that ask one challenge that i frankly don't think we'll be able to overcome and support of people now like 32 notable scientists and six nobel laureates that the iaea can do this job. the inspection regime can do their work and understand it and helped develop it. people are looking for touchstones like that but that is just a process we'll have to go through. >> this gentleman in the far back there. >> daniel serwis from john hopkins sais. october 15th is important date in the agreement because israel is supposed to talk about dimensions in the iaea. what is the criteria for successful and accurate accounting? by the way what is happening at parchin. >> these things are obviously related. jon. >> important to take a step back to remind ourselves what we were
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talking about. up until 2003 iran had an active program to develop a nuclear weapon. how do we know that? the united states declassified that fact in the national intelligence estimate. the iaea documented information provided in part by member-states in their november 2011 annex by the director general, 13 areas of possible military dimensions that the iaea was investigating. one of those was the possibility of conventional explosives work to develop a nuclear implosion device which the united states believes was conducted at parchin. the iaea has been trying to get into that facility for several years. iaea has been able to string that out for many years because there is no obligation for them to provide access in time bound framework like under jcpoa where we would have gotten accessway back in 2011 had it been in place. however we believe that the iranians ended their nucleares weapon research in 2003. we have not seen any signs that
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research has resumed. this question is whether or not the iaea will be allowed to pursue their legitimate investigations and whether country like iran that is under safeguards has a responsibility to provide the iaea access to the places, people and things, documents that they deem necessary to complete an investigation. and so what we have been working to do is not figure out what went on in parchin because we have fairly good sense of what went on, even things we haven't necessarily disclosed publicly but make sure the principle that the iaea gets what it says it needs is what we are working to support. so that in five years iran can't say, if there's a facility that the iaea has interest in, they could say that is not legitimate claim. you didn't have to go into parchin, so you don't have to go in here. what we're working towards and what we have urged the iea to work out and iran and we have linked to any sanctions relief is that the iaea must be able to
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do what they believe is necessary to pursue their investigations. and that includes insuring that they are able to investigate parchin to their satisfaction. now, the exact nature of how that the is going to work has been worked out confidentially between the iaea and iran. that has been briefed in full in classified session to all members of the congress. they have that information. they will have to judge whether they believe that's sufficient but we believe, being familiar as we are with the plan, that it is sufficient. so, we recognize that is a leap that has to be made. in terms of what is going on in parchin, i have no idea. i really would like the iaea to go there to find out. but if which believed that they were doing nuclear weapons research at parchin under this deal, we could get in in 20 four days, the iaea could get in 24 days. that is absolute. anything we agreed to in terms of clearing up possible dimensions of the past only apply to that previous investigation. anything moving forward would
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operate under the rules laid out by the jcpoa. >> there is a gentleman over there far right that raised his hand early on. >> steve land did i, manchester trade. congratulations to the sponsors. i think you set a record for attendance on august 12th of an event. congratulations format which everyone else would follow because which know the subject. my question is fairly offbeat. i make it quick. i spent my life in free-trade agreements. the. on the table idea. the u.s. has five what we call in spot agreements now in the middle east with oman, bahrain, israel, jordan and morocco. we're thinking if you want to sinned signal to minor countries why don't you consider proposing perhaps beginning work on agreement including the all arab
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countries in the middle east? i would go beyond trade and obviously not important but would include things like relations understanding, energy security, et cetera. and of course most important remember we have fast track authority for that so we could begin in the administration. thank you. >> so i, chris, i don't know, that, free trade area is beyond my area of expertise. i will say as a general, i see if chris wants to chime in at least closer to his expertise than mine. i will say this, the major reassures measures that the gulf states and our arab partners are looking for at the moment are not in the economic domain. it is not that they wouldn't be interested. not that it wouldn't have value. so it doesn't prejudge any of issues you raised. what they're looking for is general security assurance we will protect them if they're externally attacked which the president reiterated at camp david. this goes back to eisenhower, nixon, carter, the gulf car in 1991, to liberate kuwait and the
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rest but reaffirming that. then putting meat on the bone by deepening our security cooperation in the area that talked about before. so i think that is what they're focused on at the moment. i don't know if you want to say anything else. >> just to say that the agreement you said is one much more complicated than the one we just hatched which i thought was one of the most complicated agreements. i think as colin said the concern, you know, amongst gulf partners and others is not that they're goingto be outpaced economically. iran is still in huge hole economically. there is half a trillion dollars of pressing needs a hole built by sanctions we had in force. really not issue that iran will become the economic center of the middle east. so our focus for the moment making sure iran take intermediate steps to address concerns and work with partners to address security concerns. >> there is a question in the third row. i think gentleman right there. if you wait for the mic, please.
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>> thanks. -- from iaea egypt. the epercussions of deal, there is another dim men sun that should be taken into consideration, emerging access of egypt, saudi arabia emirates might ask for the same deal to be implemented and develop their own technological and nuclear capability. >> you need mic closer. >> has not been clear? >> no. >> question is clear, already done it. thank you. >> so let me take a first cut and jon will have more detail. for those of you who had trouble understanding, this is the general concern that because the agreement leaves some of iran's nuclear infrastructure intact, that it will set off a proliferation cascade in the middle east as saudi arabia,
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emirates, egypt, others perhaps turkey try to match capabilities and that set as motion nor nuclear arms race in the middle east. couple things to keep in mind. first, iran's nuclear program has been around since the 1950s. so if the mere existence of the nuclear program was sufficient to set in motion this chain of events, we have number of decades of empirical disprove of that. they have been developing in ernest enrichment capabilities in 1980s. they started the facility and accelerated that in the '90s. this is not a new challenge. if it was sufficient to tip the region into proliferation cascade which would have seen it already. second as empire call matter, active proliferation is quite rare. for example, india followed china and pakistan followed india but then it stopped. north korea it did what it did and didn't lead to south korea, japan, taiwan taking other actions. so it is neither inevitable nor
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as historical fact do you turned to see proliferation as reaction to nuclear programs. why does that matter? because this deal prevents iran from getting a nuclear weapon. what is odd about this argument about proliferation cascade, iran's program is here now in terms of their capacity. without this deal their program is quickly going to here. and they might get all the way to a nuclear weapon. with this deal their program goes down to here around gradually ramps up. so explain this. how is this more of a risk of regional proliferation than this? it's not. it's not is the answer. so i understand that this is concern but the same critics who made this argument three years ago were saying you can never allow iran get nuclear weapon the second they do saudis acquire nuclear weapon from pakistan and egyptians and turks because it was fixated on nuclear weapon piece, not just leaving some enrichment
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capacity. the last point i would make is, none of our other partners in the region are immune from their obligationed under npt, not to get nuclear weapons. i'm not sure any of them would like to pursue the course to building a large nuclear program that iran has pursued at direct expense of 100 to $200 billion, and, you know, maybe half a trillion dollars in economic damage. that's, if i look at iran i say, that is not a model i want to pursue as it relates to building a nuclear program. so, it is not, it's a concern. i think we all have to be mindful of but certainly a risk that is higher in the absence of this deal than with this deal. >> all i would say is that all countries that are fully compliant with their obligationed unthe non-proliferation treaty are entitled to benefit from peaceful uses of nuclear energy. if egypt or any country in the region wants to purchase or develop nuclear power reactors or research reactors they're fully capable of doing some i
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have no doubt countries like egypt like u.a.e., can rely on international market to for fuel and services. u.a.e. is under legally binding restriction not to acquire enrichment and reprocessing. they signed an agreement to buy two modern advanced south korean nuclear reactors with u.s. technology. they will not have problem providing fuel services to them and they benefit from peaceful uses of nuclear energy and will not have to rely on enrichment reprocessing. if states want enrichment and proprocessing because they feel iran has it and they feel that is security argument that is different conversation and i don't think serves countries in the region or their relationship in the united states. >> there is lady over on the side there, on the far left. she is raising her hand. >> -- with ihs.
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my question with regard to sanctions. are there any regulations or framework being set into place that a introduction of terrorism-related sanctions will not support iranian claims of sanctions being a repackaging of nuclear-related sanctions or preventing full implementation of nuclear-related sanctions relief? >> thank you. that is a good question i get i would say every time i do a briefing, certainly several times when i'm doing them on the hill. so we're very clear throughout this negotiation with iranians, it is very well understood by iranians we were only talking about one category of our sanctions that would be relieved as part of this deal. those were sanctions put in place over the last several years, specifically to address iran's nuclear program. that does not mean that all of our sanctions on iran are growing to go away. there are a number of sanctions that remain in place that were
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specifically and obviously put in place to address iran's support for terrorism. and those are going to remain in place. there are sanctions that were put in place with respect you are ran's human rights abuses. those will remain in place. there are sanctions that respond to iranian support for assad regime in syria. those remain in place. there are lots of things that will remain in place. one of the fundamental ones that will stay in place are those that relate to individuals and entities designated by the department of treasury for their support for terrorism. now this is unwith of the core things that we have used to try to disrupt of the flow of fun to illicit networks around the world. this is one of those things that will stay in place. all of those entities iranian or otherwise designated for support of hezbollah, hamas or any other terrorist organization will stay sanctioned. that includes banks designated for the reasons. bank sadr, iranian bank related to hezbollah financing.
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they will stay sanctioned. might not sound like a lot. real powerful aspect of this is part of these sanctions that were imposed under comprehensive iran sanctions, accountability and divestment act, bill passed by uponcongress, very powerful one paused in 2010. that bill said if you're foreign bank and do business with unof the people on our list, if you help them transit money from iran to lebanon or any other place or even from iran to london for completely peaceful activity, doesn't matter, that bank can get cut off from its access to the united states financial system. so that is you will staying in place. that is well understood by iranians. to the extent any of those sorts of things get, to the extent any sorts of those things are taking place they remain subject to sanctions. most importantly, another question i get, can you continue to enforce those and continue to enforce sanctions for those reasons? the answer to the question is absolutely yes. we were very clear in the negotiations that we would
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enforce those. if new bank starts funding hezbollah, that bank even relieved under this nuclear deal can get sanctioned again. that is not grounds for reimposing or not grounds for iran to walk out of this deal. iran will argue that is reimposition of sanctions not consistent with the deal. iran can argue anything it wants as grounds for walking away from the deal just like the united states can as well but reality is there are no commitments in there such as that. they're well-understood. so we have an absolute commitment to use sanctions and any other authorities that we have to continue to iran, to continue to counter iran's support for terrorism. >> one data point is, we're in very tense political moment both here and in iran as it relates to support for this deal. yet two weeks ago the treasury department moved forward with additional designation as it relates to hezbollah's activities in syria for example. this is part of the walking and chewing gum at the same time that i argued earlier. >> ladies and gentlemen, colin's been kind enough to agree to
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stay on till about 3:15. which gives us time for a few more questions. i have one in the far back there. and then there was a gentleman over there in the row toward the back. >> thank you. steven yelberton, a member about of the public. does this nuclear arms deal prevent iran from acquiring already ready-made nuclear weapons from north korea or any rogue sources? >> so, the terms of the agreement are quite clear. iran will not in any way seek to acquire, possess, develop, hold, look at longingly nuclear weapons. and so not only would that be in violation of the deal but it is something that we already have been very watchful for in terms of north korean behavior on its% own. made clear any transfer of
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nuclear materials or nuclear technology from north korea is a problem for us in our relationship with north korea and the region but it would be something that would be prohibited under terms of this agreement and is walled off, sanctionable and which the united states would be prepared to take very, very strong action. >> the one point, maybe it is to say something about the procurement or something but one point beforehanding it to chris is, there's all sorts of scenario we can spin out iran could illicitly acquire materials to build a nuclear weapon on their own or acquire one from other states. that is challenge we had before the deal. it isings we will have to be vigilant about after the deal. before the deal, it was violation under npt. under the deal violation of commitments to the npt and number commitments they made to the deal it civil. one of the difference between pre-deal and post-deal world, we will have such visibility into their nuclear infrastructure across the board and dedicated
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procurement channel, we'll have much higher probability of detecting activities that we actually have a pretty good track record of detecting already from an intelligence perspective but a much higher probability of detecting it in the world of a deal than a world without. >> only thing i was going to add to that exactly on con sent of procurement channel which is really core concept of entire deal. we essentially took prohibitions under u.n. security council resolutions all states in the world are prohibited from selling transferring to iran, nuclear sensitive technologies. those supplied by nuclear suppliers group. those prohibitions will remain in place. what we layered on top of them essentially a mechanism if iran wants to procure sensitive nuclear technology, let's say for the transformation of iraq reactor to reactor no longer produces blew teen yum that will require sensitive technologies f they want to buy those things they need approval by this mechanism, joint commission in this deal made up all members of
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the jpa. approval by consensus. short answer, united states has veto over single procurement request of nuclear sensitive technology. if they want to buy them for nuclear sensitive reasons we have unilateral reason veto any of those questions. if they don't go through the channel it is violation of jcpa and we have snap back sanctions and any other thing we might do in response. >> there is gentleman. >> thanks, great program. you're very slick. i'm not sure i buy a used car from you however. i have one question. we are, this country is led by three senators and yet there was no congressional observer group or senatorial observer group as existed in all, all, important international agreement negotiations since 1919 and failure of the league.
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why? >> i will defer to others on history of all. i will say that this is, this is not a treaty. it is an executive agreement. >> let's -- >> it is not a treaty. in the sense it is not a legally-binding agreement of the nature of a treat tty requires 2/3 consent of the senate. it is an executive agreement. it is a political agreement. that hinges on, you know, the continued mutual interest of the parties to implement it. so, it is different. the second thing i would point out is, it is hard to argue that congress has been in the dark. i mean, if wendy sherman were up here, my god, the number of briefings, hearings. i don't know, i don't know a single other issue in the national security space wherewer spend more time talking to congress. it is not just now as we're trying to make the case that
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this deal is good one and should be supported. but through the entire process folks from chris's team have been hauled up in front and volunteered to go up on many occasions to meet with any congress, member of congress, senior staff. i think, you know, if you talked on average day to you know, staff for senator menendez for example, on the senate foreign relations committee, they often times have better insight into what was going on in the negotiations than some of us in the white house did. i don't know know there was sense congress was somehow locked out of the details. just some members of the congress don't like details which is their right. it is alsoe the case the facts support the deal. >> let me just make one more point here as well, which is under international arms control treaties i'm more familiar with, there are things that the united states has to do, like eliminating missiles or bomber aircraft or forgo the development ever certain weapons systems and things russians and
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soviet union had to do. there are mutual constraints. the only thing that is happening here is the president is going to use his waiver authority to waive sanctions that the congress authorized with a presidential waiver in them. had the congress not authorized presidential waiver, i have good reason to believe that the white house would have threatened to veto legislation just on principle. republican, democratic administrations alike have resisted imposition of sanctions which the president didn't have national security waiver. so there are no restrictions that are being placed on united states. i think if there were you would have a strong argument that perhaps there should have been a slightly different type of conversation. there are certain obligations that put on to the united states for activities we will pursue in the future. i think that is significant difference what i think you're referring to in terms of arms control agreements and this political arrangement. >> there is no way i'm afraid i can get to all of the people with hands but this gentleman in
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the back there fairly early in the process. >> tom cochran. i'm retired. colin, in your opening remarks that you said the administration define breakout in terms of time required to obtain a arms worth of material. i believe administration's definitions is in terms of sq, strategic -- >> significant quantity. >> so my question is, if it was discovered that iran had, let's say, 60% of an sq, say 16 kilograms of atu, 93% enriched, would the administration say that they didn't have a bomb's worth or stated another way, would you agree that if the iran could make a weapon with an sq amount, that they could make a weapon of same reliable but lower yield with say, 60% of an sq?
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>> so, i'm going to let jon take on some of that but a couple of just factual predicates to lay. under this agreement for the next 15 years they're not allowed to have any enriched-uranium about 3.6% level and only stockpile of 300 kilograms of that period. why this matters, in currently different forms, gas and other forms have 12,000 enriched kilograms below the 5,000 level that is enough for 10 nuclear weapons for quantities you're talking about. 300 kilograms is a fourth of what you might need for single device. that is substantial constraint. beyond 15 years, iran never has right to produce weapons-grade uranium. >> i'm sorry -- >> [inaudible] >> if i understood your question if we discovered they had 16 kilograms of weapons-grade uranium, what would we do about that? the answer it would be a violation of the agreement and would be violation of npt. >> [inaudible]
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would you say break out of -- [inaudible], in terms of a weapon. >> i'm sorry, we simply can't get -- >> i have to -- >> i will say we define breakout in that sense, one weapon's worth and how we quantify that is kind of industry standard. it is actually not terribly controversial and i know that there are some analysts out there who suggest you could make a crude device with, uranium enriched to lower level with lower quantities but the breakout calculations that we use are not controversial. >> [inaudible]. >> i think that we, there is going to be controversy perhaps 25 years after a successful agreement as well as an unsuccessful one. so, at least that which can predict for the future. ladies and gentlemen, i think we have reached the point where i'm going to have to bring an end to this. there are probably are going to be many other opportunities but
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