critics insist that america cannot trust iran. i agree. isolate the series of doubts about their government. senator carper. we need not and, indeed, should not trust the iranian regime. implementation of this group may be challenging and we need to be prepared for the possible the iran well violate the agreement. senator casey. when iranian extenze chant death to america and death to israel the first question we have is how in the world can we trust them to live up to an agreement? the answer is we cannot. senator stabenow. even under the deal we should expect the iran will cheat when it came, particularly at the margins. they don't continue our wrapup its these daily activities and sponsorship of terrorism. with additional resources provided but increased sanctions relief, that will seek to break that if the opportunity presents itself after 15 years with specialized inspections state

and it limits on its nuclear program are lifted. senator corker. iran has misled us in the past when it comes to their nuclear program. senator markey. what a condemnation of iran. what an indictment of this nuclear deal with iran. but this indictment comes from the supporters of the deal. in spite of their own words these democrats have chosen to give iran billions of dollars that would be used to fund terror and war and ultimately put iran on the path to nuclear weapons. so let there be no mistake for history about the consequence of these democrats choice. with iran detonates a nuclear device, these democrats will bear responsibility. when i read launches a missile capable of hitting the united states, these democrats will bear responsibility. with iran kills more americans as it has in iraq and afghanistan, lebanon, saudi arabia and elsewhere, these

democrats will bear responsibility. when iran imprisons american hostages, these democrats will build responsibility. when iran attacked israel and hezbollah's missiles or hamas tunnels, these democrats will bear responsibility to put iran kills jews around the world in places like argentina and bulgaria, these democrats will do responsibly. when iran massacres its own citizens these democrats will bear responsibility. president obama and these 42 democrats bear a direct political, moral, and personal responsibility for the coming crimes and outrages of iran's ayatollahs. there will be grave consequences for them and for all of us. >> apa administered gina mccarthy joined officials from colorado and new mexico on capitol hill to testify about the wastewater spill at the gold king mine in colorado.

live coverage at 10 a.m. eastern on c-span3. >> u.s. ambassador to united nations, samantha power, spoke to reporters at the "christian science monitor" wednesday. she responded to questions about russia's support of the assad regime in syria and the u.s. fight against isis. this is one hour. >> okay. here we go. i'm date code from the monitor. thanks for coming. samantha power, permanent observed united nations. this is her first visit with our dining club come of a number of ambassador power's predecessors at the have been our guest starting with george ball and george h. w. bush.

samantha power emigrated from ireland when she was nine. short of not just degree and a law degree from harvard, tried our trade of journalism for a while. during the time she wrote a stirring op-ed for the "washington post" calling for the us government to do more to win the release of david wrote who was then being held by bosnian serb forces that i was editor of the monitor so that meant a lot to me. she won a pulitzer prize for welcome a problem from hell. i guess what i become a professor at kennedys, harvard kennedy school of government and founding director of the school's center for human rights policy. prior to her tour at the u.n. the sound effects are thing we spent a lot of money getting extra here. she was a special assistant to the president and senior director for multilateral affairs and human rights on the national security council staff. she and her husband harvard law professor cass something all

parents of two young children and thus into the biographical portion o of the program, now oo mechanics but as always we are on the record. please, no live blogging or tweeting. short no fun if they come with a breakfast or lunch is underway to give us time to listen to our desk. is to embark when the session ends. to help you curb government was self the urge will enough several pictures of the session to all reporters here as soon as of the lunch ends. as regular attendees know if you like to ask a question, please do the traditional thing and send a subtle nonthreatening signal and i will happily call on one and all with the time we have available. we'll start off are for our guest he opportunity make opening comments and then go to questions. and with that mexican for doing this. >> thank you so much for coming. sorry we are starting a little eight. i thought what i would do this just dedicate a few minutes on the top to talk about the upcoming general assembly. it is the 70 anniversary of the

united nations, and more heads of state are descending on new york than we've seen a lease in the life of this administration and we of the stories looking see more than ever before. of course, the pope is also visiting so between the pope, president putin, president xi, prime minister mobley, president obama and his estate it's going to be at that time to be tried on the side of manhattan. suffice it to say. perhaps because it's the anniversary, perhaps because the secretary-general is entering the last year of his term and, of course, we are in election season, starting elections easier for the presidency, for whole host of reasons there's a lot of soul-searching about the u.n. there always is every general assembly district people reflect on the year that come before, but this year it's more pronounced than usual. and on the one hand you have the

fact of agenda a silly coming together again reminds people sort of where we were last year and one of the things that happen lash when present obama was there was a u.n. secretary-general ban ki-moon used the high level gathering to try to mobilize the international committee around ebola. at this time last year we are passing around charged that show that you have 1 million infections by january of 2015 if the curve was not been. and now we're looking at i think the w.h.o. figures for this week are five new cases. this time last year would've been close to 700 new cases, and even what-that deeper in the fall. so that's an example of collective action, multilateral action at work, and shows even though it was very slow start up cost and a lot of people unfortunately died of ebola, it was also an example of the

international committee building the airplanes, a fluid in an important way. and then, of course, the nuclear deal over iran is also something that has hardened not just this duty counsel or that the p5+1 but the broader membership, because there's a belief of new york at least that this is the way the u.n. should work. you have a country acting in violation of international norms, the security council comes together, put in place over many years and incrementally more and more exacting sanctions regime, calling on that road country to come into compliance with international norms. that country then comes to the table. we come to the table. we secure an agreement that on behalf of international peace and security cuts off iran's pathways to nuclear weapon. and so there is again a sense that this is an exemplar of what

the international community do when it is united, when it is prepared to enforce its words, et cetera. then you have scenes of kind of biblical processions now from the coast of turkey, descending on the doorstep of europe whether from series or afghanistan. this comes on the heels of the scene -- serious -- comparable images off of north africa to send it on italy. of course, earlier in the year and they be the european union coming to the u.n. security council looking for an authorization to take a set of steps to try to stem the flow of come in a responsible way. and then, of course, in east asia as well that ships floating and being claimed for a time by nobody come at the plate of the people in burma, and others who

are just again putting everything on the line and sadly trusting very affairs smuggling networks to try to promote the welfare of themselves and their families. so if you need a more vivid testament to the commons, the high seas, is probably come there's no more of a testament than that and it really raises questions of course about burden sharing and by the serious conflict in reticular and the need of course for the long elusive political solution to that conflict. just to present preview of president obama will be doing when he travels to new york for the general assembly, we are doing, he welcome the first day he arrived he will participate in the summit in which they sustainable, so-called sustainable the above goals are embrace. these are the goals that are the sequel to the previous millennia

development goals which were, this is called up the post 2015 agenda and it's a series of goals to end inequality and extreme poverty for the first time it is an agenda that interweaves the environmental agenda in the to take of our oceans and to curb carbon emissions and so forth into the anti-poverty more traditional economic development agenda. it's a very important set of goals and targets can a very long set of goals and targets, but president obama will join other heads of state in embracing those goals, and in laying out an agenda for application because these articles no now that will take s another 15 years. they had a very interesting and i think in many quarters and expected affect in that you started to see ministers in the developing world meshing themselves and their performance on the basis of how they were

faring next to these goals. so literally report cards on malaria or on girls education, et cetera. have a new set of goals. donors will channel resources to those goals and get at least, if these goals are realized, which is the are very ambitious set of goals, some of the kosovo conflict as well will be addressed because of course we can't just do with conflict. we have to deal with the root causes of conflict. two more points just on his schedule and then i will wrap up. you also under second date in new york contain along with a number of other heads of state of the secretary-general and unprecedented head of the peacekeeping summit. you might say why peacekeeping, the united states doesn't have a large number of blue helmets. it turns out that we are calling on u.n. peacekeepers to do more

and more places and the more difficult places than ever before. and the supply of peacekeepers is being outstripped. one only needs to read the newspaper to see how outstripped it is either demands. and there have been some noteworthy changes in peacekeeping since some of us covered the balkan and other complex and balkans back in the 1990s but it used to be that european peacekeepers were about 40% of u.n. peacekeeping indeed in the '90s they had about 25,000 peacekeepers. today europe only constitutes them there so 6000 european peacekeepers and the number of peacekeepers around the world is way higher than it was in the '90s, so they are rent six percentage of a situation where some of the, basically of developing countries doing the peacekeeping and different cultures like the united states at the other big donors to the u.n. paying for it to its extreme import that the

capabilities that these nations have in places like malik and south sudan, often places where extremism also -- mali. -- after that those capabilities be enhanced. so the mandates have got much more robust than 20 years ago but the capabilities of those troops on the ground are not what they need to be. indeed, the ability to even know what's coming at them in parts of mali, the blinders of peacekeepers because of the lack of uavs or the lack of ability to do it in which extremist are where. it's a real liability. president obama is voting with his feet and we spent the last years since ms. president biden chaired something similar last you would with the secretary-general of the human to try to mobilize troops and police contributions from other countries. it's a pledging conference -- vice president biden -- we have more than 40 heads of state have signed up. in order to speak, a head of state has to speak about what

needs to be contributing so it's an unusual kind of event and a very important terms of its investment in collective security. lastly, i know something on everyone's mind, the president filed in new york he will convene a summit on counterterrorism. it will have three segments. the first will be the anti-isil coalition of which there are now more than 60 countries who are part of it. the second segment will be the sequel to what president obama did lash at the general assembly, which was he chaired a meeting in which he secure the passage of u.n. security council resolution on foreign terrorist fighters. base of the great new set of obligations for u.n. member states in terms of sharing information and preventing the foreign terrorist fighter flow that has been a lifeblood for isil. and then the third segment will be encountering violent extremism. you may see these all kind of overlapping, and they are to some extent, but counterincounterin g violent extremism as with all community

leaders, religious leaders, civil societies. it's not just states that are a part of that and, of course, in order to really capture people for the become foreign terrorist fighters and when you're in military conflict with them, community action is going to be indispensable. these are the three sort of prongs of the catechism, counter and to attend angela very different country participating in each of these segments but the meeting. the very last thing speed at the. .. thing. >> this is -- >> this is really my last question. >> i want is a word about something we've been doing the last couple of weeks to draw your attention to it. it's a campaign called three to 20. president xi and you and women are going to be convening a high level meeting ahead of state meeting 20 years since the beijing summit on women's

empowerment. and unfortunate all around the world including in china there are many women who would not be participating in this conference entity are not participating in civic life because they've been in prison for actually speak out against sexual harassment or against corruption, et cetera. so evidently up to this event that will be convened again during high level we the u.n. to we are profiling one both in political prisoner, and i have -- pass around a little chart, but we have a visual and, indeed, the visual can't teach woman's picture is being hung in the façade of u.s. mission to the united nations to cause heads of state and other dignitaries walking to the united nations they will be able to see the prisoners who are being profiled. we are working actively diplomatically to try to secure the release of these women from many of whom have been in show for sometime but but i just wanted to draw your attention to the.

thank you. >> my ceremonial softball was going to be but the beijing 20, we will go right to my colleagues. >> we will do one by one. [inaudible] -- the first time in 10 years he will attend the u.n. g.a. another the number of issued i guess what that would be not that ukraine has kind of -- effect is deploying troops there, the fact that his foreign minister have talked about creation of antiterrorist front. how does the united states handle this, given the fact that

the united states is opposed to any kind of intervention that will keep, that will stabilize assad come and get the united states action when you think about it shares an interest in keeping assad where he is to prevent the creation of a power vacuum in which either nostra or isis or isil could move and great even more chaos in this area? >> well, let me address the assad question first. it is a myth that assad and his labors have been directed at isil over the time in which isil has established a safe haven for itself in syria.

indeed, i believe "the new york times" and others documented a whole series of transactions between isil and the syrian regime. all the assessments show that in terms of the attraction of jihadis to serious, the ongoing -- syria, but more than that the ongoing tactics that he pursues in trying to retain power, namely gassing his people, beryl bombing is people, arresting peaceful protesters or anybody suspected of dissent and then, of course, ms torture that has occurred in the prisons. these come as a british colleague suggested in the security council meeting, every barrel bomb that syria and assad drop is a gift to isil. so, you know, we have made clear from the beginning that is going to require a robust

international coalition to defeat isil. but the idea that doubling down on the assad approach to counterinsurgency, namely, to treat isil and moderates and civilians and hospitals as equally worthy targets, that is a very perilous approach. and so our shared interest is serving an interest we share with russia is degrading and defeating isil. but the approach of supporting a regime that has helped fuel the rise of isil, that is a misguided approach, and it's not the approach that we will take. >> michael gordon from "the new york times." >> i would just like to ask a follow-up on that, on this question.

jonathan remarked on the russian military moves, but in the diplomatic sphere i'd like to ask you two related questions. the russians have sometimes suggested that they are not wedded to any particular personnel in syria, not wedded to assad. in your experience as a diplomat at the united nations has there ever been a serious proposal by the russians to work with united states with an eye toward the political transition in which assad woodlief powerquest how the russians ever seriously propose that come and have ever proposed an alternative to assad? and lastly, for minister lavrov's call with secretary kerry yesterday, he apparently floated the notion of military to military talks between russia and the united states over the syria situation.

do you think that would be a useful step to take at this juncture? because the russians assertion is that they would be going after the islamic state, not after the parties. thank you. >> thank you. let me say just a couple things about russia's the posture towards political talks. i mean, first, russia has embraced from the beginning the geneva communiqué which calls for the transition of a governing body by mutual consent. so that means, on the one hand it gives the government and the assad regime a say in what that transitional governing body looks like but also gives the opposition a veto as well, those there's no sooner in which by mutual consent he opposition would agree to something which assad state. and that is something that

russia signed onto a long time ago, but i would note also that produce some of these news reports around stepped up military supply, that we in the counsel for the first time in a very long time actually agreed to the security council product which is called a presidential statement, supporting special envoys efforts which include an explicitly wrote this into the statement which was agreed, adopted by consensus, basically negotiations to give rise to transitional governing body. so there's of the geneva communiqué from a couple years ago and then more recently couple weeks ago a refresh in which i can they signal the. moreover, as you know, we have been engaged in secretary kerry has been in very intensive communication with for minister lavrov and with other stakeholders in the region in order to see again what kind of flesh one could give to the idea

of transitional governing body, and moscow has been inviting to its capital opposition politicians as well as regime and politicians as a way i think am i would have to check with them in terms of what their motivation is, i think to get a sense of the opposition and who is who and so forth. that is what i described are the rough contours of russia's investment in the political process. they claim that, notwithstanding this apparent infusion of military hardware, just to be committed to a political solution here and that is why we are engaging with them at the highest levels to try to convey of course that it is not tenable to think you can defeat isil while supporting assad, a

version of the same argument i gave earlier, and to stress again that there is no military solution. and that if any actor goes all in on the military side as there is a risk perhaps as happening now, that's just going to prolong the conflict, exacerbate the displacement, enhance the risk of further chemical weapons use, whether by chlorine or by something else, and over time of course just strengthen isil's and. so that is our message up to this point. and the extent of our dialogue at this point is the diplomatic. so we have not had military to military contact on this. >> no, but they have proposed military to military. you think it is a good idea or not? >> we are talking diplomatic channels. >> can i do a follow-up? there was a star in "the new york times" this morning about a possible meeting between president obama and putin where they would talk about syria.

dnf anything you could say but that this afternoon? >> i can't speak to the general assembly schedule. the are a lot of questions like that one can ask the we will announce the announced meetings as soon as we have them. >> i also have a question about syria, but very quickly before that on ukraine, do you have information about separatists in eastern ukraine who have been blocking assistance moving into the region since the beginning of august? is that something you can confirm or at the least effort something about? >> i think i want to get back to you with details. i don't know if there's a specific shipment our convoy you're referring to but -- >> sodomite. >> okay. i will get back to you on that. >> -- [inaudible] spam now that the european problem seems to refocused attention, certainly by congress on the syrian issue and there is a series of hearings this week,

both republicans and democrats seem to united at this point in really voicing their opinion that the administration strategy just isn't working, that it's not fast enough just as it is the general dempsey said recently he thought there was stalemate after year of the air campaign. and increasing calls for forward movement on some kind of safe zone, some kind of, something that would change the equation there. and one thing, if you have seen the same feelings among your security council colleagues who aren't part of the coalition, are they advocating for a change in policy? is there more pressure to change the military strategy in any way that would stop the exodus, that would stop isis advance, and

whether to engage with or against directly assad? and also could you update us on the status of his efforts at the moment? >> i think just for all of the dissatisfaction with the on the ground, you know, graphically embodied death of a young boy on the beach but so many other families who suffered so much and now are more visible because they are descending into european cities, there are on the hill and edward else a great plurality of views on what should be done. and they really run the gamut and has to also i think on the question of greece settlement of

refugees to its true on the question of safe zones. it's true on the question of the anti-isil campaign. i do think investigative counsel you see something comparable. certainly there is an urgency in light of the european, very high level european discussions about quotas and resettlement and how to cut of out the problem at its source so that these flows update so that those who have moved can be taken care of, but that the system doesn't overload so shove that strand. ..

[inaudible] the kinds of things that are being said aloud, do you sense, do you sense any strong interest in what's going on among those diplomats and their leaders? what are you hearing? >> do i have to give a diplomatic answer? [laughter] i have not done a straw poll, but my guess on the basis of this sort of feedback i get in

the hall is that the unprecedented viewership of the first republican debate, that some significant share, i shouldn't say -- some modest share of that spike came from other countries ambassadors watching the debate. in other words, i think there's more interest at this stage of the election and some of the more colorful aspects of the primaries and there might've been in the past. but look, there is a deep interest in who runs america. and some i think as things window down i would probably hear more, right now until things sort of settle you hear about specific individuals and so forth. you just hope that cooler heads will prevail and will continue to exercise leadership in accordance with international

norms and to continue to want to go multilateral coalitions and so forth. you more here in the affirmative and an appreciation survey for what president obam president od to the entrance of engagement, the sort of perceived return to the u.n. and we went and we paid our dues and we best in u.n. peacekeeping and so forth. doesn't even more acute appreciation for those investments. >> one more crack at achieving perfect clarity on what you're saying about syria. you have made very clear that you think there's a difference on premises. it made it very clear on doubling down on assad is a bad path for russia to follow which also noted the russians have had a series of interesting diplomatic meetings in moscow. it's possible for optimist to look at that is a maybe the russians are doing two things at the same time, maybe there's something worth your exploring. when you say they're doubling

down assad, is the in the nature of a warning or a final assessment of what their intentions are? is there anything on the diplomatic track worth exploring at this point with the russians? >> i mean, we're going to continue in the aggressive way that secretary kerry has been at it over these last weeks to engage russia diplomatically. and i do the same in new york every day with my russian counterpart, because we mean what we say. there has to be a political solution. there is no military solution. in terms of what russian intentions are in this moment, what the infusion of military hardware connotes, i think that's another reason to continue the dialogue and to make plain to get the perspective that i check your

which president obama articulated forcefully on friday, but also to take note of the fact we all have an interest in defeating isil. and as the president said on friday, i sold does oppose -- isil does pose a threat that will get president clinton's attention. -- president putin's attention. in addition to figuring out how to bring about a political solution for syria for its own sake, it's clear that political solution is the sine qua non overtime to being able to wipe out a movement that has ensconced itself in a part of syria. i think, i'm not passing judgment at all about what the intentions are but i think some of the comments that senior russian leadership have made suggest again that assad

military approach is one that requires more support and more help. and fundamentally, you know, we believe that the political track and actress in a very different message to assad, namely that your country will be destroyed if you don't see fit to engage in negotiations in a manner that produces this transition which will cause not everyone in syria to put their guns down needless to say, but again the goal is to get a critical mass of factors to embrace a political settlement and that all of us will be in a much stronger position against isil. [inaudible] -- how concerned are you on development in northern ireland to deceive the u.s. role in keeping good friday accord going? secondly with president xi coming here next week, it's hard to remember that build up of any

summit in recent years with more provocations and more problems. why shouldn't we expect that summit to be a train wreck? >> doesn't look to be a train wreck? look, i think, let me take the china question first and then i'm going to ask my colleague to flush out, i will say something on northern ireland and ask her to supplement. as everyone has long said and has become more plain in the run up to the visit this is a complex relationship. everyday whether it's on south sudan or an anti-isil foreign terrorist fighter measured in new york or the peacekeeping summit where china has dramatically expanded its contributions to peacekeeping just over the last five years,

we are working with china on issues that are very much in the u.s. national interest. by the same token, whether it's on cyber threats, freedom of navigation, human rights, one of the most important features of the free the 20 campaign or the chinese women who are part of a given china is hosting this event. and so what you will see is plainspoken, i think public comments about our disagreements. and not papering over the problems on which we disagree, engaging in the internal meetings in a matter where on the back into this trip we hope to be in a better position on areas of disagreement, i.e. where our positions are heated and we start to see changes in things that are so troubling. but i think in general the approach of this administration which has served us well is about on areas of disagreement,

and a special on areas of disagreement as a serious as those that will come up on this visit its extremely important to engage come and get them to secret that president xi is an extremely powerful leader of a country that is of course extremely important on the global stage. and that kind of dialogue at that level, you know, something they want to take advantage of to try to unlock progress. and then on northern ireland i which is of course the situation is very worrying. traditionally come at a know this is some who comes originally from ireland, i think that the united states role is always welcomed. i think we're in a situation now though where it's politics as usual insofar as the parties

themselves have taken responsible up to this point for implementation of the agreement and fundamentally whatever nagging and a tiny can do from behind the scenes, ultimately this is something that will have to be settled among the parties on the ground. >> i don't have more than that actually, but you get more specific details you and i can be in touch afterwards and i could help answer questions. >> -- [inaudible] except 10,000 syrian refugees with far too much and he said the country jittery to accept as this 100,000 syrians. what are your thoughts on that? also as a follow-on, lasher the president called for an emergency preparation response to the people that request. can we anticipate similar emergency request and with some of that funding be used to reset of refugees your article to the programs on the ground that are funded like the world food

program? >> take you for the question which is extremely important. i think up to this point week, a tiny, have received from unhcr, cases process, candidates are eligible for resettlement. president obama has made very clear that the number we've been able to resettle up to this point is insufficient and that will need to expand that significantly in the next fiscal year. i would note, you know, over the life of the obama administration we have managed to resettle 140,000 iraqis refugees which has gotten less attention. it's been an up and down program. we've had come and i think it made significant improvements in the system such that we are at the same time both able to welcome people in desperate need but also make sure that we have

a vetting and screening a set of security measures in place where we would have confidence in the people, to the country or not take advantage of the program to, you know, who are plotting or doing something antithetical to national u.s. security. so i think the system in place has been strengthened over time. the flow of iraqis i think shows that. a startup costs around the syria program, you know, have been significant and we have to break through the. in terms of what the right overall number will be next year, we are continuing to reassess that. this is of course an issue of acute rt. i think was important that the administration came out and made clear at a minimum we would go from 1500 to 10,000. there are diverse views on the hill as to what the top one should be for a refugee program as a whole but also how many serious we should take. this traditionally is done in a

matter what we tried to come to some consensus with folks on the hill. i think the conversation is just picking up and we welcome senator durbin's or postal and we will consider it carefully. and begin we will need to make sure that all of us collectively whether for 10,000 or for a higher number, the all of us who have had the experience of working with refugee families whether iraqis or syrians or from any country, that the american people also view themselves as messengers for the kind of country that we have been overtime advocate of country that we need to be of course in a time like this your. ..

>> said the united tape has given far more than any other country in terms of the u.n. appeal and are pressuring for the most year years of the crisis was to sustain nearby in the hope they would be returning home soon, stay in countries like jordan and lebanon where they have the same language and are able to better integrate than when they move wholesale into new cultures and communities. the united states has spent $4.1 billion over the life of the crisis intending to humanitarian needs inside area and neighboring countries. 2.1 billion non-refugees alone.

and yet the u.n. appeals are woefully underfunded and in need just two weeks ago, i believe thousands of refugees in lebanon were sent to text message by wfp say in their food rations would be cut off and that is becoming more and more of a routine occurrence. one of the things we are going to use at the pope's visit to do is to try to leverage our contributions and try to also mobilize contributions not only from other countries who have not been as generous as the united states suspended this point on the financial side, but the private sector citizen action foundations, a lot of people moved in siberia in the neighboring areas in the united

states is a long tradition of combining u.s. government resources with that of other nongovernmental actors and president obama is committed to using his pulpit to mobilize an additional resources from the united states. >> jessica schultz from the "huffington post." >> back in march prime minister benjamin netanyahu said -- they responded by saying they would reevaluate the approach to a two state solution. there have been talks of parameters for a palestinian state. would the u.s. vetoed the resolution of the past and if we didn't support a resolution, perhaps trance mix is open to some sort of two state solution. >> well, i can't speak about hypotheticals because in my

world, every day there are different initiatives floated. right now we are all very focused on the escalating tension in jerusalem and urging restraint and again the preservation of the historic status quo to very destabilizing , potentially destabilizing situations right now. in terms of what would happen at the security council again without tax that is hard to say what we would do. i can't say president obama has said that anything that would undermine israel's security or is biased or one-sided, you know, the united states would oppose and we oppose something like that in december just this last year and there is a resolution put forward that was then balanced and not something

that would advance the cause of peace in the middle east and the two state solution. last week i guess it was, i'm losing track of time, and there was an after -- a successful effort to raise the palestinian flag and i made clear in voting against the resolution that the status quo is not tenable. there has to be negotiations towards a two state solution, but there are no shortcuts either. the difficult intentions this issue is that the parties have not been able to get passed up to this point. we have never reassessed the depth of our relationship with israel from a security partnership with israel out of iran chap or here will also be sitting down with israeli officials than thinking through how we deal with the other kinds

of threats that iran poses to the region vis-à-vis support for terrorists or other forms of threat. as part of those discussions the u.n. issues will arise. >> let me do a little negotiating. do you want to hold us to our regular time? we are happy to do either. >> five minutes more. from the daily caller. >> last week in the house of representatives bipartisan group of members introduce concurrent resolution recognizing islamic state targeting of christians and other religious minorities as genocide which would have certain legal implications. certainly this is an issue near and dear to your own heart. was sort of his generally to respond to no-space-on and like you say, you know, everyone

wants to see the defeat of isil. is this something with more common cause than the other big pictures in this area and iraq question. >> certainly at the united nations and we will see this amount president obama summit, there is really widespread unity. needless to say there's no one in any meeting defending what isil is doing and there is broad unity are not only the need to combat them, but broad recognition that has to be a military component to that. having said that, again president obama will say this i am sure when we talk about foreign terrorist fighter flows, insufficient progress since last year in terms of information sharing and changing laws to

prevent travel from those who may be contemplating joining trance heaven are going for training. we have our worst case. the nature and the gravity of threat and isil has asserted chemical since last year in additional new parts of the world. you have even more countries coming forward and wanted to work together to think through again how to bring about isil's defeat. it will be extremely important for every country should be in full compliance with revelation 2178 for more countries to contribute to the training and to the military effort in iraq and syria. this is a question moving beyond

an abstract consensus to true burden sharing. this is going to be a long campaign. on the genocide question when president obama decided to intervene militarily on behalf of these cds come he also invoked the specter of genocide. there is no question the mvps and christians christians and she has an algae bt come if you find yourself a minority, that has proven a death sentence for many -- not a death sentence, certainly a displacement sentence. having said that, a sunni in isil territory are living under horrific hardship in anyone

dissenting or being in opposition using whole tribes and families wiped out. so while isil is targeting minority groups as such, it's monstrous ideology applies well beyond national religious groups as such to anybody who doesn't share his worldview. >> wheelman of time for one more. i apologize in advance to the several people still waiting. j-juliett houseman from the post. >> i want to ask you about the pope's visit obviously with a lot of anticipation. could you tell us a little bit about the relationship in ways that might not be obvious. people attract what's happened on cuba and priorities the president and pope have. when you talk to people in the white house and those close to them, they talk about both the american public life but also

the complexity of both local means someone who's technically escaped, but you're not doing it like you normally would do and also can be so unscripted and it's a difficult to predict. can you talk a little bit about how you're doing this and how one takes advantage of the. >> i think i'll be more modest and i respond. it sounds like you've done a lot of thinking about this. i will have the privilege of getting to be part of an administration but also thinking about this from the standpoint at how is the pope moving mobile public opinion on a set of issues that are very important to the american people and of course the collective good. so i would only note that we are

in crunch time when it comes to the climate debate and climate negotiations. we through a series of bilateral engagements by president obama himself and most recently with brian deese traveling on following up on the work john podesta has done, the united states in part also because of the regulations put in place is in a very strong position against lead by example, but not all of the major emitters are where we would like to see them and the pope has tremendous sway well beyond his catholic flock. his message in new york is going to be extremely important in helping all of us in the international community train take more significant steps to save our planet to put it

mildly. if i could also note as somebody else said, this refugee crisis is something he himself has spoken so eloquently on in the past. i forget how is that it. but the negotiation of indifference, his trip is one of his first acts to meet with migraines and one of his first by pope sanders political speeches was on the micro flow out of north africa and here he's visiting at a time where the u.n. appeal is woefully underfunded, where this is a contested issue within our own country as people grapple with how to balance security concerns with the desire to be generous and concerns with greatest traditions leader is sure to hear what the pope says and i

think there is a nice convergence of the timing of this trip and a set of issues that could not be more urgent where we really do need to establish whether in climate or i'm dealing with acuity is not only this theory is that the 60 million refugees who accessed globally, we need more hands on deck and hopefully the pope can use his clout to help get us there. >> thanks for doing this. appreciate it very much. [inaudible conversations]

>> outgoing army secretary john mchugh spoke at the american enterprise institute tuesday about the future of the u.s. army. has remarks focused on military readiness, budget cuts, mental health and the accidental shipment of live anthrax to labs around the country. this is an hour.

>> welcome to the american enterprise institute. it's a pleasure to have all of you and of you and a guest of honor rounding out our series with the service secretary coming off our series of the joint chiefs last year. i really can't think of any better way to add that, like cherry on a sunday with secretary mchugh who will reflect on the entirety of the obama administration today are not just a fad department, but government service. true civil servants in every respect and he's been an unsung hero for the army and soldiers that are in it forever. not just in this capacity in the executive branch bitterness long tenure in the house of representatives nine crewmembers from new york and many other

roles and missions and responsibilities held in the last 40 years. a&m on kmart to host an end to have him here and welcome all of you. we will be live parts of this with hash tag mchugh@aei. i know you know him well enough to have shown up to be here today. mr. secretary, thank you for coming. it's a pleasure to sit and talk and learn about not what is next for you, but talk about looking back a little bit for a moment and then we'll open it up for questions and get you out of here on time. there's been a lot of things with what the army was dealing with and it's been a wild ride. you've dealt with significant challenges. >> i arrived when things were

very painful after two theaters of war and we knew pretty much where the challenges lie and what our missions were going to be. we knew who our friends unless friendly opponents were. as you noted, didn't have a habit of turning around on you. if you look at the last 20 months particularly, certainly from the army perspective, the many missions and challenges largely unforeseen. even ebola in west africa. we had thought about the united states in the foundational for spare to hear what the challenge and we were called upon and did it. isil was not the force challenge that it is today. the activities at eastern europe

commandeer venture was not on her plate directly, et cetera. the good news is the man women wear the uniform in all ranks and have been able to adopt and have responded. it's been pretty breathtaking to watch from the perspective of the secretary. >> absolutely. in some ways it's a high-profile public job and other ways there's a lot of work you do behind the scenes than the chief will take the lead and you have a relationship the two of you and you does why. is nine years ago you had over 100,000 soldiers deployed at the duty roughly. while they're in different places templates relatively high for different personnel and servicemembers. it's a challenge because you

remember the difficulties of long deployments, one to one dwells to play the ratio time and how challenging that was and now we have of course i'm a rotational basis push forward. at the height of the iraq and afghanistan wars, stabilize, take care of people. and then we switch to this current model and nobody wants to be in the garrison force anymore. how do you manage the expectations of a changing world and what the army is going to do? >> that's a critical question. as you might imagine i've been asked repeatedly what keeps you up at night. there's any number. one thing i worry most about as they transitioned out of the conditions you describe were virtually every soldier knew at some point or another going into

a combat theater. some went to iraq and afghanistan repeatedly. that incredible challenge and with 26 trips to iraq and afghanistan including my time in congress. i was always amazed to see the young lieutenant's captains out doing things and having the authorities they had to be two or three grades higher if not more and complex past and they enjoyed that and learned from it and one of the worst things we can do is to bring leaders like that that enjoy getting out is being a soldier. all the kinds of opportunities going forward somewhere provide an ornamented as you noted. i'm the one hand, the reality of the world taking care of that

for us whether you like it or not. you mentioned 100 or do six soldiers right now and preparing to deploy in some 140 locations. something unsettling that still provides the opportunity to engage in trade with other nations, but we have to begin to do better home station training. we have to make sure that we are maintaining our combat stations. soldiers loved to get into the field and train and we need to as well focus on other things. broadening opportunities like education partner to partner relationship opportunities, just trying to do everything we can to make life in uniform of interest and challenge to our

soldiers. nobody more so than a soldier. we have to be creative in how we keep them excited about being a member of the team. >> they are going to complain if you send them out there and if they're not. they want a fulfilling career in the service to the country which i respect deeply. that segues perfectly into another important shift in priorities although throughout the obama administration and the civilian teams at dod has had a focus on people. civilian dod and uniformed more of a longer conversation about diversity. not just in terms of gender, race or religion but in terms of life experience. this links to ask harder and the

secretary's work in particular and the need to bring people in and kick them out into the real world with a more lateral entry in the system, changes to the upper upper motion, fewer pcs throughout one's career. preferential treatment for duty stations if you're a high performer. a lot of this holistically speaking a force of the future. but it's a conversation that's been underway since the national guard and reserve commission and there is a discussion of continuum of service. manny is ranking member with conversations under way for arguably a decade and there've been changes like the joint chiefs and other types of compensation changes. this continuum of service model

is about to do. do you see progress made in the last 18 or is this something because of the executive and legislative ranch they probably have two different definitions. unlimited a lot of a congressionally approved. can we make progress, can there be a big bang approach the goldwater-nichols or is this something that's going to take years and it showed? >> there's an opportunity here as you know. the first thing on capitol hill and the pentagon is in agreement that something needs to be done. while most matters are new ones differences as to both what and how to do those things between the fun side of the potomac and the pentagon as they call it a capitol hill. broader issues of agreement can provide the foundation to do

some positive things from now until the close of the administration. if nothing more, build a solid foundation by which the next administration can continue to work with the next batch of leaders in the pentagon. the other thing that is encouraging and you mentioned secretary carter and secretary work takes this seriously. there is a fairly described aggressive outreach to silicon valley, but the challenges are more broadly based than was silicon valley is likely to provide and the emerging technology the military knows have requirements for personnel. they are competing as the private sector and if you look at the military in the past and

phalanx of tumors, et cetera, et cetera, you can understand not. the approach all of this take is how do most importantly can we preserve back war for us because for of the military primary sponsor abilities, but on the margins in terms of these highly technological skill sets, we've got to work more cooperatively with the private sector. i think we are making good progress there. is hard to point out a cadre of personality examples of that. we offer opportunities and iu cyberas an example, that the private sector can't offer. we are in the face of highly publicized challenges. the private sector as well. we conduct operations. the private sector does not. is that the opportunity for the skills that development important ways can be

considerable value to the private sector and we can work better together to make sure we are both interested in better served. there are some real chance is for doing a lot better. >> your colleague, secretary of the navy was here and made some headlines. he talked at length about the budget challenges thank you and achieve space, the growing money better spent on core business functions and processes that the department like logistics, health care management, contracting, et cetera. in many cases for good reason. you grow the army in particular and the force after 9/11 to understand the dod civilian workforce has grown miserably. no one knows better than the

army the active-duty forces dropped off precipitously as quickly as fast as the army can do what i believe. there are no comments or productions and the workload and the dod civilian manpower. in the 90s when you are on the hill, that is the normal flow of things we could argue. we would argue, we would probably agree. we all think there's a piece coming often elusive. in the 90s when we thought it would be one comic came out 28%. this time around is actually converted and the army and the dod civilians are flat. that's a tough challenge. it doesn't mean they're not doing vital work. it doesn't mean they're not necessary. put all the caveats aside.

the army institutionally is looking at challenges readiness of coors, the three-legged stool and all three affected by what's happening in the civilian workforce. what advice would you give your successor and how to think about those priorities it is only enough dollars to fund one or two of them. how do you order them for risk management in the best way possible? >> i didn't take notes on my friend ray made this comment. they are finally recognizing the challenge to reduce their faces as we say because as you noted without a production workloads don't reduce. i will speak for the army has taken on the civilian work force reduction aggressively. the secretary of defense ordered

us to reduce headquarters by 20%. i upped that to 25. that is not without some concern as you understand of the army hall. we are overachieving there. we also by the way to the definition of headquarters to two start commands and above which was more broadly based acquired by dod or the congress. at the height of the civilian workforce in this era of two conflicts of war was 285,000 not because civilians say we want more. and we could take operational or generating for soldiers, those who are training, those in our school houses, it better, et cetera and put them into operational positions and we substituted civilians as they went forward. we've got to rationalize that

with the reductions as the noted congress and senator mccain have been very clear about that. and by the end of 18, we will in the army be down to about 233,000 civilian employees, reduction of over 50,000. i haven't done the exact map but it's the equivalent of a reduction we have in our end strength as well. we can't do what we need to do when they think of armies without civilians doing it. you were very gracious and noting that. ..

but because it's required by this fiscal reality. we are focusing on s. nt, looking at things, rather what would like to have 20 or so have because we think it may be necessary. in looking at developmental issues where we know we're going to need certain things, particularly for the soldier and the squad, better armored assistance, reactive armor, better system for operating integrated visual environments, robotics, unmanned aerial

vehicles, uavs, et cetera, et cetera, better energy programs to both save money but also to lighten the load on our soldiers, diminish the number of convoys that provide an inherent danger, getting water to from point a to point b. these are absolutely critical things to matter what the army are what come i should say what the enemy may look like him who ever the enemy may come from. we tried to be smarter, but our business continues to be a concern for me. our metric is somewhere, it depends you can get an argument in the g3, 60% or 70% but i believe that question open. right now we are about 32, 33% ready amongst our combat formations. the unforeseen nations i mentioned. while that's sustainable for a while, as i said and both general odierno and i, the former chief, testified

repeatedly come if sequestration returns, any meaningful budget reduction in addition to that which we're trying to manage right now, or that next unforeseen thing of any jamaican comes forward, we are in very, very bad place. i've testified should either of those occur, let alone both, somebody is going to have to ask us, tell us to stop doing something and, frankly, as a look at the work right now i'm not sure what that would be. so this is a critical turning point for the army and for the department of defense and, obviously, logically for the nation. why we are following very carefully what's going on up on capitol hill. >> i think we are that was remarkably eloquent and i think general all in on his way out the door make sure to make force about respectful comments but anyway come out swinging to policymakers as they prepare to

think through how to fund the government beyond this is a short-term continuing resolution that i think he was right to do that, to lay down a really bright red line in terms of how low it can go in terms of readiness, et cetera. key to the first part is the remarks in the last question was i think the link you made between readiness and modernization to get the soldiers better energy, better technology, whether that's at the squad level, it's not just about rotations, right? it's about which are providing to them, but they are driving and remotely piloted, what their weapons and munitions are, what they're capable of doing from et cetera. i don't think there's that nuanced -- i don't want typical the hill. i think on the policy committee there's a great understanding of challenges you're facing. >> i agree.

>> but it's a segment of congress as you well know. a key statistic option surprises me every time i hear it is, the majority of congress, i mean we are some and 60% range new to congress this administration, just while you're been secretary. if you were to go back you would know the majority of the faces. you would know them because of the top but not from working there. which means the learning curve and to restart any education seems to come its more frequent where we missed the ike skelton's and we missed the carl levin's and when is the gene taylor's. we all know the old bulls who were around many years of you as well. shorter cycle and turnover and the policy space which makes it i think even more difficult for servers secretary coming on board. i think the intention is usually in the right place at their limited by politics and by the

bca first and foremost. a lot of the situations. so putting on your politician had, just a meaning it, you don't have to if you want to come but if you on the hill at you still ranking member, chairman of armed service committee, what would you hope for, but which of leadership that doesn't sit on these committees and hear about the day-to-day challenges the military facing up what would you hope beyond reversing sequestration, which wanting to repeal the bca entirely? >> look, i'm a recovering politician and i'm not sure where i left my politicians have, but he mentioned this. we are very, very confident and comfortable with the posture of our oversight committees. the members understand the nuances. that's why they are on those committees because the other members want them to be experts.

if you are talking about the leadership, particularly senator reid, senator mccain, mac thornberry, adam smith, and their subcommittee chairman's am i think they're trying to do everything they can to help other members be they of some duration, some tenure or otherwise to understand this. that's our challenge to it all we had to do was get our committees to act, whether it's repealing bca or some other measure, we would be far better shape. but also how this democracy works. that's been a challenge. you mentioned, if you talk to any member, most members, they will give due deference to the problems we are facing. but in fairness to members and in part this is the culprit to the united states military, that they are not having to deal,

thankfully, with a 9/11. this is not a world war ii environment where every person knew somebody who serve. these individuals go back, and their constituents award about their next paycheck, the survivability of social security, what their children's futures going to be, how is education. that is what members are focused upon as well. so the challenge not just for congress and for our leadership on the oversight committees but for us to our legislative liaison is to try to help other members and their staffs. as you know, mackenzie, the staffs are critical to bring issues to members and helping them to understand it. is our job as well. i mentioned in a forum i was in last week, given the state that we find ourselves in, we have not been as successful as we would like to be. we are continuing those efforts whether it's a structured one in posture hearings or an

opportunity show our stuff and a u.s.a., which is coming up in october, or just go into the hill every single day and trying to meet with psm's, trying to meet with mla's and tell them the realities of what we are facing. we are doing that but it's, if this were easy we would've been passed of this already. >> one of my last questions before we open it up and if they don't ask i will keep going to ms. on the aviation restructuring initiative. we were briefed on it extensively by the brainchildren of it, the army, active duty service members, officers. it's remarkably well thought through, just terrific i know it's been difficult to move through the system. but it's the right thing to do. and it's right thing to do with the money going up or down i think for the only. so how is it going ask how is

the hill reacting? do you see this moving forward? effect much greater success in the air force proposing similar changes in the way they operate and with what systems. i commend you for the. i think you learn from their mistakes, smartly. what d.c. for the next 18 months in that regard speak with this is hard. i appreciate your think it's the right thing. right or wrong, i think you get a debate on the right aspect of that, it's a necessary thing. i'm not sure we would've gotten to it at this point in our developmental efforts were it not for the budget constraints. the reality is the analysis showed very clearly it could save us $12 billion over the life of the drawdown and operationally a billion dollars a year. but we just could not continue to afford propping up those.

and the apaches you mentioned from our aviation brigade are amongst some our most hard-pressed and their first out the door. we very reluctantly but i think as i said inescapably made a decision we made. just to be sure we've got a whole lot of outside analysis. i know aei has looked at it. we have formal reviews from rand and keep that osv. not always our highest operations. but all of them said as you did that the hardness of this, it's done well. and we are going forward in regard -- and the guard is meeting the requirements. we are somewhat constrained by legislative limits, but we are living with those and we think we can continue to do that.

but we do need to execute this. and it simply, as i said, the right thing to do. i understand the guards concerns, but we've not just try to take from them. and by the way, the vast preponderance of aircraft taken out of, will be taken out of the active component versus the guard, but we recognize they have a vital role as they've demonstrated over the last 14 years operationally. and the concern that occurred perhaps the most often is there no longer have a combat role in the air come and that's just not the case. if you look at a combat support and combat missions flown in afghanistan, the vast majority were not flown by apache. they were flown by black. we are prepared to give them 1000 or so new some of her most

modern black. not only does that maintain their role in combat and forward, but it also fulfills an athlete critical need that they have in their title iii commissions their title iii commissions from their homeland defense of the national disaster, stable missions which we believe is essential as well. we've tried to do so puts and takes this move this over. the guard continues to be concerned about it. i fully understand that. and from the congressional perspective with the commission on the future of the army that's continued its deliberations. i think it's likely come in fact i'm sure that until the commission reports back and makes some recommendations or lays out courses of action for the congress that we will kind of stay steady, stay here and we will see where that goes. >> great point. i'm glad you brought up the commission. i was out in death valley resort thanks to the us army --

>> i've been there for six years. >> this was actually at -- the west coast death valley. for operation dragon spirited become super bowl of combat training as it was involved and it was quite impressive. it was a joint forcible entry exercise. may understand the army has not done one of those been maybe 10, 14 years. >> cost us to focus on one mission. >> it was all of your capabilities and equipment and soldiers that are basically the first ago in 72 hours of the crisis. it was incredibly oppressive. more than just multi-component. it was interservice as well with a heavy air force presence. it was truly impressive and i hope you are successful and make sure you more washington people out there absorbing. >> you know, our new army operating concept does a couple i think very positive things, focuses on later development.

not try to predict 20 years from the future but trying to make sure we have tomorrow's leaders who are comfortable in the unknown who can react rational rationally. but it also emphasizes the joint force. in today's era you have to present multiple dilemmas to an enemy. if you're a one trick pony company get the best this service without the service, that's great, but if an enemy knows all you've got is 100-mile an hour fastball, they're going to figure it out and react to it. the joint force is essential, and as you saw out in death valley, we are trying to return to focusing on fat. obviously in the army's interest, but i would argue it's an all the services and in the nation's interests, because we want every branch of our service to be the best. and if and when the need comes, operate effectively together. we haven't had the chance

because of other circumstances to focus on the so we're trying to return to that kind of basic skills of. >> i commend you on your outreach and education. undersecretary kendall was there, secretary work and others and i think that's so critical for the army to expose policymakers in decision-makers to see the army in action, giving them out of their comfort zone inside the beltway. we will conclude our remarks and it opened up the question. please wait for a microphone because we do have chemistry and they will not be able to hear you. we will call on record first. good old friend and good friend of the army as well. >> most times. [inaudible] >> you probably said you were a public servant and i think of you as one because i think of you when you came to washington as they could government guy, i mean, that's what you here to do. >> and i have to to quite frankly to watch in congress actually become you didn't fix congress, it was pretty

dysfunctional when you left but although on your behalf -- >> the president blames me for leaving. everything went to hell after i left. >> it did get worse after you left. >> i'll take credit for that. >> i think he targeted the same thing at the pentagon but i would say you did not tame the beast of bureaucracy at the pentagon as much as you might have wanted to do. so i'm wondering if you think now, then what you think of your performance educated to washington. you tried hard to make things run. i think you were a pro-worker, pro-government person at a time when i don't think most of the government, most of your party, is pro-government or pro-worker. i'm wondering how you feel about that? >> softballs are over. >> good to see you again, rick. i remember when i worked in albany as a staffer, the senator i worked for had a cartoon on

his refrigerator in his conference room, and the caption read simply, when you up to your ass and alligators, it's sometimes hard to forget that your original intent was to drain the swamp. i went to the pentagon i think like most senior leaders both uniform and selling to come with an agenda. we wanted to do some dramatic things and acquisition. we wanted to take some steps to professionalize and provide professional develop and opportunities to the civilian work force. we've made progress better, but i've admitted previously, it's nowhere near where i can of notionally hoped we might be, but reality kind of slouch in the face in these jobs. and certainly from my time as secretary, when you walked in and all of a sudden you are in two theaters of war, that pretty much takes up a large share of your energy tank. we have been working hard to meet the realities of both

training, men and equipping those soldiers to get them forward, hopefully to keep it as safe as possible while they're in the theater and get them back safely. but equally dedicated to care for their families. one of the first things i found myself doing was taking our family care programs, which were about $600 million, and doubling that share of the budget to 1.2 billion. i felt that was a moral obligation frankly but that's your basic reality here that today's soldier when they are for word doesn't need to be, it will always worry about their families but you don't want them worrying about things that they shouldn't have to worry about. so we focused on taking care of those families. and now we are seeing such things as ptsd, the aftercare for some pretty significant wounded soldiers and how they go forward, suicides, all of those things kind of say, you know,

man plans, god laughs. so it would have been nice to focus 100% of the efforts on the agenda that we laid out. i did a happy to discuss i think the progress we have made in those areas that i kind of outlined, but you've got to do with the wolf closest to the sled, and for us that's been in a different direction. i guess that's more an excuse for anything else but it's really a reality that i think i've had to deal with. and again, it has far less to do with me as secretary or any number stars on anybody's shoulder, but this only today is the greatest land force the world has ever seen. and for all of you very, very bright people in the pentagon in my mind after one simple reason. the young men, particularly and the young women of this nation continue to step forward and

they are incredibly competent, skilled, dedicated, and amazing patriots. i wished he didn't ask me but i wish every american could see the true heart and nature of what these amazing soldiers do. i would extend that to all the services. we are a fortune the country to have volunteers who will come forward and do this amazingly difficult stuff. >> i agree. so why don't we work -- forward right to left. >> hello, tom, how are you? >> very well. how are you? >> asked me in a minute. >> as one of the nation's or pentagon's top officials for its bioterror labs, can you explain why they've had some difficulty tracking deadly changes like anthrax and ordered a moratorium 10 days ago? >> starting with your second

question, i ordered a moratorium out of a sense of extreme caution. and while as i think the cdc and others have stated that we don't see to this point any threat to human health and safety, when you're dealing with these kinds of legends, i think a better policy is to err on the side of college. we continue to examine these. you asked me a question about how this happened. i'm not prepared to say that. i mean, we've got some partial answers. all of them correctable, but i think we want to be very, very sure that we understand as completely as we can the full picture before we come out and lay out a way forward. as you know, part of the moratorium i ordered included all the labs under my executive

authority to retrain, to check protocols, to check standards to make sure that the people in various positions have the right skill sets, and for doing things in the right way. this all started with a question of protocols, of the scientific base of protocols that you applied against these pathogens to make an inactive, on the actually valid. and i don't know as we know the answer to that right now. these are things that are very, very complex and challenging. i don't pretend to be an expert in the science behind it, but i'm going to make darn sure that at least insofar as my responsibility goes we are taking every step possible to make sure that the public is protected and that we develop a way forward that allows us to conduct these tests, which absolutely essential for the security of this nation and its people in a way that's a safe as

humanly possible. >> as you include your tenure i'm wondering if you could talk about sort of acquisition in brawl the but also to a very specific portfolios that have sort of some unanswered questions in them. the one being the next generation ground combat vehicle, and the other being air and missile defense. sort of where are you leaving things and what's next in each of those areas? >> it's kind of like writing why own obituary. when i first arrived at the pentagon as you heard me say, it was no secret, certainly from my time on capitol hill, that army acquisition was not performing where it needed to be. so one of the first things i did

was order a report that later famously became known as decker wagner. i think it's important to note that wasn't html cache and ngo study. it wasn't. it was as looking at us. while it came in and told us of things that separately we knew, it was shocking to see it all in one report, and just a piece of the findings, from 1990-2010, 22 failed army major developmental programs, which cost taxpayers about $30 billion. you didn't have to be an analyst kendall, boy, we have to do better. and so we kind of look at how did we get to the place, and as they are, these complex matters to a lot of different answers. and part of that was the next big shiny thing, immature technologies.

everybody wants something that they think might be available. and the army had a habit of investing in his development of programs on requirements come on things that were unlikely and we now know at least in that period, never did field. and so those programs just weren't able to come forward. so we try to rein in our requirements programs. i remember the first iteration of the ground combat vehicle after i arrived, the rfp came out with over 1000 must haves, telling the potential bidder you got to give us all of these things. to everybody's credit we kind of look at that and said that doesn't look like a lessons learned to us. it looks like a repeated lesson. so we went back and scrubbed that down to under 200 about some essential things. we allowed contractors to try allowed contractors to try to trade off requirements against other capabilities, et cetera, et cetera. we understood sometimes do enough is good enough, and also

recognize that the affordable way for us in the future was to build something in a fashion that incrementally from generation to generation you could add onto and adopt do whatever the new realities of the day may be. i won't tell you we've turned that one of 80 degrees, but in the last five years most of our developmental programs were on time and on budget. the reality we've had to deal with, as you mentioned, is available monies to opinion than what it was through an outright budget vote on whether we go goo a continuing resolution that doesn't allow you oftentimes to reconfigure needs within a program. we decided ground combat vehicle, for example, to put that aside. gcc, despite the urban legends to the contrary, that was on-time and on budget. there was a performing program but it became in the near-term

unaffordable. what we did was put that aside. we are examining technologies and advancement that were developed to the point is they will weaken due to maintain those and pick that back up in 2023 or so. we absolutely need a new generation of infantry fighting vehicles. are ground combat vehicle i should say. then reinvest those savings among we're going to spend their inner other ground combat fleet or upgrade, modernization packages on our bradleys and honor abrams and such. that's again a political, excuse me, and monetary necessity. it's not a failing program. so now the way forward depends on the money that lies ahead of us. we are challenged as well in missile defense. when you go and talk to partner nations one of the first things

to ask about our patriots. i visited many, many of our folks forward deployed and they're the ones deployed are sold amongst the most deployed units in the united states army. while we're trying to go with missile segment and has been, that becomes a money issue. to which you are able to do in large measure in every aspect of the military is what you are funded to do. so we will see. >> quickly here and work our way back over this way. >> george nicholson, global soft foundation to you talk about the acquisition requirements process. lessons learned. the replacement for the helicopter coming out of vietnam was awarded to lockheed and it was the cheyenne built and flown, canceled. >> that was in that period of those. >> next replacement was the comanche built by boeing. build, phone, canceled. the last two years, the a or h.

by bill. built, phone, council. at a lessons learned from all those three been put in the new process that the army is using? >> thank you for digging this up. sadly, i can in others, not just in the area fleet but in some of our other development of programs as well. look, we didn't sit down and analyze virtually everyone of those programs. i'm sure someone has got that sitting on a shelf somewhere, but by and large what we have found in terms of our procedures is, as i said, an over reliance on undeveloped immature technologies of unreasonable requirements and always trying to get the very, very best next thing. kelsey grammer did a movie called pentagon wars. i don't know if you have ever seen it.

not exactly historically accurate, but probably not totally unreal in terms of how developmental programs have been approached in the past. i think in one instance they were putting a porthole into the bradley. so we are doing better day. i can't tell if you had we done the things now that we failed to do that can the comanche period, but that would've been fielded, but we have found that it's from a prescriptive perspective very beneficial in today's efforts. but again we are not doing any major development of programs until the 2020s or be on. it's one of those proverbial out years. i always said every night when i go to bed i prayed to god that one time he will let me live in an alley or because everything is going to be great in the out years so we'll see if that comes to fruition. that's a budgetary reality, not

a failure of our development people. stay tuned. >> thank you, sir. i'm jim from the atlantic council. i'm going to ask you not about equipment but organization if i could. back in the 1940s that can develop nuclear weapons and proliferate in the '50s around the forces. tactical nuclear weapons and then soviets develop nuclear weapons and the army thought we need to reorganize because we are afraid nuclear weapons are going to be coming our way on the battlefield. so the plane was something we called the pentagon the division. this wasn't well remember but it wasn't him by the army to deal with, do with the offset strategy coming back at you. so than in the '70s and 80s, precision weapons. i think u.s. military got really good at sending loss of precision weapons towards enemies.

and now kind of worried, and this is why i think the deputy secretary of the second of defense are talking about a third offset, worried about a coming back the other way, towards the precision weapons coming out american forces can potentially. if the army tried, if a lot of ground forces out of a tactical nuclear weapons, as an organizational challenge, is there an organizational challenge for land forces in the future? do we need to rethink organization or do we need to double down on the third offset that we don't need to, what do you think? >> look at, we've got a lot of very bright people who think about a lot of different things. the third offset is one of those things that's under discussion now. i'm a fundamentalist when it comes to warfare because what i worry about, third offset come

is somehow that denigrates the role of land forces. war is a human endeavor and humans live on land until we sprout wings or develop gills. and so they signed him were always going to need an army in spite of discussions about sanitizing war and fighting it from robots at 30,000 feet. but to your point, sure, we future cast all of the stuff. and for us that work is done in a variety of sources, not the least of which is training and doctrine command. to look at that age of combined out with the combatant commander oaklands. the way goldwater-nichols qaeda struck this out of his combatant commanders have their responsibility areas of responsibility. they look at the challenges, both today and tomorrow and how

to best address those. so there's that coordination. i can tell you how that's going to come out right now. again, we were dealing with more immediate, me, day-to-day, more administrative and budgetary and political challenges of running the army. but i don't go to bed at night or don't stay up at night worrying about without thinking about something because we're always thinking about those kinds of things, and the fact that you're tracking the third offset strategy which show that this is an active process. i can't tell you how that's going to come out. >> spirit i'm met meredith walker, an economist focus on >> spirit i'm met meredith walker, an economist focus on national security and a philanthropist focus on military and veterans initiatives. as our nation's longest-serving and most most dedicated sector of the army, you've traveled extensively to meet personally

with our men and women who serve in the army. you've also said that we civilians would be very amazed if we could see our army in action, as you have. would you please share with us one of the trips that impressed you the most about the men and women who voluntarily choose to put their lives in harm's way, so that we might be free? >> second service, longest-serving, i don't want to take credit for stuff. one of my trips to afghanistan, all my trips we try to go forward to a combat outpost. and one trip we went to this little village. we had a combat outpost, probably half-mile away from the actual village. and we went into the outpost and i met with the command

leadership for this whole area, a captain and a lieutenant or the lieutenant was about six months out of west point. and they were it, although and h their troops. they had spent recent weeks clearing their portion of the valley of the taliban, if anybody has been to afghanistan and seen those, they are like the cement walls. they are after, doing that military action successfully, they worked with the local sherbrooke on the supposed elders that i went and met with and most were in their mid '20s it seemed to me because many of the older people had been killed off. got them to agree to work with our side, not accept the taliban out of the worst of concern for any other reasons, had developed a local militia, taken these

local villagers and path them how to be an effective militia. all at that level of command. and as i said normally he would have a couple stars running around in generations past doing this kind of stuff. and to see those kinds of young people come as i said, that captain was a special operator at the time, is just breathtaking. the other thing, last time i told this story i broke down a little bit, we were transiting through and we were visiting troops while our crew was getting rested. and the soldier had just been brought in. he had lost one arm. his other arm was wounded, mangled terribly, and one leg. and he was incubated.

and they said you can go in and talk to them, even though he's unconscious. we don't think you'l think you d you. so i went in there, you know, i bent over, whispered how proud we were of him, and what a great american he was calm and pressed eight going into the one hand that he had left. that soldier, incubated, saluted me. it's amazing. >> -- almost made it. >> i can think of a better way to in than honoring the people you represent, the soldiers you represent, and their families. there couldn't be any better question or response on which we could conclude our day's discussion. so we wish you well, sir, and your next endeavor. i know you're not off the jacket as a second longest serving secretary the army. you are in intel november 1 or until your successor is confirmed.

but i want you to know how grateful all of us in this room are grateful for you, 20 away often not in the public eye in this job in particular. thanks. >> thank you. it's been an honor. [applause] [inaudible conversations] >> all persons having business before the honorable mr. prim court of united states are admonished to draw near and give their attention. >> number 759, petitioner versus arizona. >> we hear arguments number 18, wrote the way. >> marbury v. madison is probably the most famous case is

court ever decided. >> existed as an enslaved people here on land where slavery where not legally recognized. >> it would take presidential orders, the presence of federal troops and marshals come and the courage of children. >> we wanted to pick cases that change direction and import of the society and also changed society. >> so she told them that they would have to have a search warrant, and she demanded to see the paper and to read it, see what it was, which they refuse to do so she grabbed it out of his hand to look at it, and thereafter the police officer handcuffed her. >> i can't imagine a better way to bring t the constitution to

life than by telling the human stories behind great supreme court cases. >> mr. korematsu the boldly opposed forced internment of japanese. after being convicted for failing to report for relocation, mr. korematsu took his case all the way to the supreme court. >> quite often many of our most famous decisions are ones that the court took that were quite unpopular. >> if you had to pick one freedom that was the most essential to the functioning of the democracy, it has to be freedom of speech. >> let's go through a few cases that illustrate very dramatically and visually what it means to live in a society of 310 million different people who helped stick together because they believe in a rule of law.

>> landmark cases, an exploration of 12 historic supreme court decisions and the human stories behind them. a new series on c-span produced in cooperation with the national constitution center, debuting monday october 5 at 9 p.m. >> and as a companion to our new series, landmark cases, the book. it features the 12 cases with selected with a brief introduction into the background, highlights and impact of each case written by veteran supreme court journalist tony mauro, published by c-span in cooperation with "congressional quarterly" press. landmark cases is available for $8.95 plus shipping and handling. get your copy at c-span.org/landmark cases. >> the u.s. senate is about to gavels in on this thursday morning as lawmakers continue work on disapproving of the iran

nuclear agreement, an attempt to address the nation has fallen short of the needed votes twice. today is the last of the caucus and act on the resolution. now to live coverage of the senate here on c-span2. today's opening prayer will be offered by reverend camille murray who is the pastor of georgetown presbyterian church. the chaplain: let us pray. eternal god, we give you thanks for the many provisions of this day and for the simple and sustaining gifts which enrich our lives. we thank you for the beauty and bounty of this great nation. we offer praise for the heritage we share, the faith we cherish and the freedoms we enjoy.