lot of training. these guys were called -- tongue in cheek, referring to them as knit wits, but also 7-7. the difference between 7-7 north -- correction, 7-21 south london, we believe the absence of a last-minute visit by a capable bomb maker that caused the bombs to not go off in the south london strike that did in the strike of the northern part of london two weeks before. so there is something to a core and construct, taking something which can be comical, mildly tragic, into hugely tragic, that we have to be careful to not misunderstand as an important degradation of the core. now, that doesn't mean that it can't resurface elsewhere. my point is, if we instead focus on how those pathways exist when you don't have capable training camps and people working with impunity and how you look internet and other places to find the disgruntled who suddenly want to change their name to islam and next day show up at a recruiting station with

a rifle. which seems most groups that plot to attack the west want to go right now. they want to go with the weapon, the mumbai-style attack. and i think we have to give our law enforcement for being able to track that. that doesn't mean come placency, but it means those kinds of attacks are the ones we should fear, because they require less high-tech, high ability to get in with a management and training perspective that al qaeda core brought, but a lot of other groups really don't. >> well, not exactly all the way to that. more in terms of, you know, the long term. i would -- first of all, if i may say about bin laden's great -- every single person since the death of the prophet mohammed has wanted to have the islamic -- wanting something does not necessarily mean they can do it. ca leave awants it -- you have to be realistic.

we cannot just say a list is something of a strategy. and then say this is a global insurgency. i'm sorry to say that, mary. because that is only that. that is -- now, it never is going to happen within the muslim world. first of all, you have to realize this, history is important. we, unfortunately, ignore history at our own peril, including recent history. the other thing that is important, we just don't want to see some contradictions in our own policies in the region. we have a relationship with the country that has played us like a fiddle now for 35 years, and that name is pakistan. we just don't want to see the facts about pakistan for a variety of reasons that i don't want to go into, including the fact that we basically made ourselves a hostage of pakistan, because of our own afghan policy. i mean, if you have only one route and the other route has to

come from uzbekistan or god knows, the russian courtesy, then obviously pakistan is going to do whatever you want to do. i'm sorry to say that. the other thing that i clearly see that we don't want to understand about the salafi movement is saudi arabia. i'm sorry. salafiism is another word for mow haddism. this is what it is. and it has started since the 1960s. and as long as we don't understand that, even today. i just gave you this thing that is american-published that the lawyers find that [ inaudible ] and this has been -- the 9/11 victims. and then we look for terrorist groups in latin america that doesn't exist. this is something that we have to see. we are failing american people if we don't realize some of this. so kalifat and all this is just that. it's a pipe dream. the problem is that muslim

community is never going to be -- one of the things that it is dangerous right now, and i will go to that, and it is getting more and more dangerous, is the intensification of sectarian and regional conflicts. we're making even a country -- turkey, everyone is going to pay a heavy price for his ambitions. instead of zero problems, he has problems with just about everybody. so what i'm saying is that all of those things, i agree 100%. and i am no expert on that. we have to follow the somalia disenchanted, the pakistani, whoever it is. at the level of grand strategy, we have to be a little bit honest with ourselves. that how we have been shooting ourselves in the foot -- we keep saying that taliban and al qaeda don't have any relationship. whoever believes in that believes in tooth fairy, i'm sorry. and i'm -- going to say to you are -- i will shut up.

but i was invited for that. because that's the only thing i can contribute. the regional context. >> don't go away. >> i'm not going away. >> a word, mary and then go. >> one point of clarification. you're right. everybody wants to create the kalafi. >> except me. >> all these groups. these extremist groups want to create the kalafi. and it's a question of aspirations versus capabilities, right? so the -- hez ba at that is a great example. they attempted to carry out military coups. failed miserably. weren't able to do anything. and when i look at al qaeda, i see that they have not just that aspiration, but they also are talking about world conquest. well, the issue for me is, where are they at in actually achieving their objectives? so to me, what i see is, the

first objective of overthrowing these rulers seems to have happened through other means, but there is places like egypt where mubarak is no longer in charge. but immediately they wanted to set up sharia in those places, and there they failed. the only places they have been managing to set up sharia are places like somalia or yemen or iraq or northern pakistan. where they have imposed their version of sharia to the ever-lasting hatred of most of the people in those countries, by the way. and then the creation of these emirat emirates. they have declared multiple emirates. i believe that the correct metric for measuring whether they're successful in these areas or not has to do -- >> there are no consequences. ten people created an emrat, and there is more in the village. >> to me, the most important metric for saying whether they're succeeding or failing there is are they controlling people's behavior? are people in those countries

forced to wear the clothing -- forced to grow the beard, forced to pray the way they want them to. forced to give up kite-flying? and all of the other things. the kind of state they want to create is very similar to what the taliban created in afghanistan. and there they were really good at controlling people's behavior, despite what most of the people wanted. and the other thing i would say about this is -- >> fear. >> absolutely, fear, intimidation and murder. so absolutely. and anbar province, we saw that on the ground, we got to see that for ourselves. nobody there really wanted these guys, except for some people who had some, you know, revenge fantasies. but anyway, i guess the important thing is that there's -- there's what people want and what is imposed on them. and everywhere these guys who have this jihadi salah fee kind of ideology have managed to impose their vision and where al qaeda claims they control these people, only with the help of outside actors have we been able to get rid of them once they have set up their so-called

emrat. so the people of chechnya were incapable of by themselves kicking out these guys. you had to have an outside actor in. and the people of afghanistan were incapable of getting rid of the taliban, even though they hated their guts. they had to have outside actors to help them. and i see the same thing in somalia and yemen. outside actors are the only ones who are able to do something. now, does that means the united states has to be physically itself involved? no. that is, in fact, not the obvious policy implication of what i'm saying. in fact, that -- iraq should have told us that our presence there in some ways created more problems than it created help. our prolonged presence in afghanistan might have created more problems than it helped to solve. so i'm not making an argument for, you know, some sort of boots on the ground, u.s. must be physically involved in all of these places. >> but there is another thing that we will forget about at our

peril. and that is that throughout the 1 1980s and '90s, we saw salafi islam as an antidote to the so-called revolution to islam or hoe mainism. this is what it is. because we thought they were noting about to be revolutionary. we thought the salafis were just praying and wearing beards and so on and so forth. and now they have metastasized. even the whole creation of taliban itself. this was linked to regional rivalries, i'm sorry to say. we have to look at the context. i mean, you don't -- you can't start -- [ inaudible ] the other thing -- it's a pity mary left. you have to have a die electric particular approach to these things. yes, some people may turn to taliban. and afghanistan people turn to taliban as a result of the long civil war that, you know, happened. and countries do not return to normalcy after about 30 years of war immediately and become nice

democrats and start doing this. and the same thing in the way that the salafiism has gained influence now even in egypt. a lot of the salafis are the ones that people who went to saudi arabia to work and are coming back. i mean, you know, we have to look at the root of it, at the source. and this, unfortunately, is the source. and the other thing is that anywhere that the state power -- disintegrates, you're going to have all kinds of terrorism. yemen, for example. today it's al qaeda, tomorrow, something else. but the whole civil war that went on and the external intervention into civil war, now al qaeda's major concern in yemen is the hutis. so that's -- >> milton, one thing to the point of your question. when a tactic is successful, it will be emulated, and we've got a lot of crazies in our country who know how to make a bomb. we don't need help from anybody

outside. and we've seen that in some attacks already. that's going to happen more and more. with no influence from anybody from the outside, except that it works. unfortunately. >> okay. next question, please. identify yourself. >> i think the cue for my question from the good general. from his talk. and then it's expanded by a good deal that was said by the other people. i'm wondering, what evidence -- that is, what really primary source material exists for any change in game plan, as you pointed out, may well be the case. it is in war. of any changing game plan by al qaeda. whether it's game plan as a terrorist group, or whether as one of our speakers said, it might be a game plan for something beyond just being a terrorist group. do we have any evidence, other than conjecture, for any kind of

change in game plan? is. >> well, let me just offer that -- and i too am sorry that mary has left and matthew would probably be able to add a lot, as well. beyond what i can. but, yes, we do. we have evidence that al qaeda is a thinking and promulgating organization. it thinks and promulgates through a couple primary media. one is its based website called al fasiar, and has a newspaper that it prom gates messages and information. and predominantly, we get the tone and tenure of where al qaeda's core believes it's headed, from the releases and the pronouncement the s by now zawiahiri himself or those listd in al qaeda as the -- either the heads of internal and external operations for the different functionarie

functionaries. so for many years, you had one or more of the libyans promulgating basic doctrine, and libby who has since deceased. so they get their time in the air, and then they get their time with the drones. and then somebody else steps in. so that's kind of where we hear and see. so we have seen the tacting change here. we have seen them want to reach out and aspire to what i call owe opt, others call franchise, but to co opt some of these local level niche knife groups. and i would argue to you that's important both ways. for the local level groups, it's been important, although we need to watch carefully to see if the importance still resonates after bin laden's death. it's important for the same way the common turn was important for people like the revolutionaries in vietnam, or the revolutionaries in other parts of the world, because it was a signal for fund-raising, okay? a signal to these very places sha reason is talking about that

tend to give the charities, and the charities are underregulated or overfocused on liberating law, and then those funds and charity information pieces tend to find their way to these groups. and so i think that's an important part of the signalling and the affiliation. but it's also the other way, where the groups announce and speculate zawahiri does, or one of the al libbies or al mass ares, pronouncers on these different websites what it is they expect or want and how they want to manage the message about egypt or palestine or now about syria. and clearly zawahiri wants to send the message right now that syria is the place to congregate. and he has said, he much more than bin laden. because bin laden did not want to take on the shia until after they dealt with the outsidin fidels. and the logic here was the shia are smaller, at our beck and call and mercy once we recognize the i'ma, the faithful on the sunni side. and this is an interesting tact. zawahiri is asking for much more

to exploit the secondtarian violence against the al awhite in syria. and that's important. because as sha reason indicates, that does play into another broadening theme in the wider middle east, which is this shia/sunni split, which is anchored on re add and tehran hostilities over nuclear weapons but also over this belief in re add that the last decade has unfairly advantaged iran. and so this is all playing out here, as well. so this is the interesting tactical shift we see here. let me talk about tactics, though, okay? tactics don't belie strategy. and here mary's point applies. to the extent al qaeda matters, it matters for what its overall aspirations are. and if it's not an aspiration that says only violence can bring change, then you've not got al qaeda. you've got something that back in the days of marks would have been analogous to trade unionists or social democrats.

but that takes time, that takes 150 years to fully develop through a political process. but if we get to the point where all the heads of al qaeda's residual core want to do is talk about how they are influencing the brotherhood in parliament in egypt or syria, i think that that ideological battle is just about won, okay? because then that means the voice is the people, speaking through guys who may have been revolutionaries at one time but are now in a political process. that's what's will out, okay? so al qaeda in that analogy is still to me the bull she vicks and they can't do without the oxygen and violence. so watch for those claims and statements. that's truly where they're trying to find footing because they've lost a lot of footing in the last decade as people have had alternatives in the greater middle east and as other voices have arisen. >> yes, tom, if i could. i think you touched on it a couple times. i think for a game change watch, watch the money. it's not about money. it's all about money. it's always about money. it's what's going to drive them and give them a capability.

i think recently, and i can say this in a general sense, i don't have anything to back it up. i think we've realized that, and matt from his background in the treasury could probably speak to this far better. we've started to employ those tools to go after some things. and when you take their legs out in that accord, ideas are important, religious beliefs are important, but if you don't have the capability to do it, you're going to fall flat on your face. and the sooner i think we can lead, we can go down that line, and employ gangsters of capit capitalism in this fight a little bit more, i think the better off we're going to be. >> that's good. >> if i may respond, norton, to you as an academic, i hope you will have an opportunity to look at the -- this book just published and precisely because of your question, we provide that selected al qaeda electronic political communication persuasion. as you know, the general can

defeat an army. but the general cannot defeat the mind of the peasants. and this is what we have to deal with, is both continuity and change. general gray, would you like to ask a question or make a comment? >> yeah, i -- this has all been very interesting. >> you have to use the mic over there. or this mic. >> it's all been -- certainly been very, very interesting, and most enlightening. it's always really good to hear what academia and other experts from several disciplines have to say about this topic. i was wondering, though, as i listen to all this, all right, what do we do now? it seems to me that one thing that was not discussed at all is

how do we -- how do we get the media on board with our intent? one way, of course, would be to really come up with an intent. what do we intend to do in the next 5, 10, 15, 20 years? take the long view with respect to how do we -- how do we end up with a better world for everybody, and not just focused on the united states or on western ideas and all that kind of thing. but how do we -- how do we set out to try to improve the world as we know it, for everybody? that ought to be the kind of goal that our country could help take the lead in, in the future. and as i say, 20 or 30 years from now. it's interesting, for example, that we don't seem to really learn an awful lot from history.

one of the things that history teaches us is that really, freedom is not necessarily universal value and all that kind of thing. that many people in the world are more interested in so we ned to look at that a little bit and look at our history and see what really can be done to, to make the world better. and i think in terms of terrorism, terms like a global war on terrorism and all that, that's just not correct. terrorism is a tactic. it's a tactic tactically and strategically, it always has been and there's been examples not just in the last century,

but terrorism, tactics and that kind of thing about back into the koran and the torah and you can find it in the bible. it's a classic state of war, it was phase ii of mao tsedung's philosophy. we need to prevent catastrophic types of tactics from hurting any nation, our nation or any nation in the free world today. that ought to be one of our primary goals and one of our primary objectives here. we, we forget for example, that the asymmetric value of terrorism, those are the kinds of things that present real dangers to us. i also hope that we do not get overconfident here based on what we've heard here today. we should never underestimate

the enemy or the other people or anything like that. that breeds disaster in the long haul. we want to be very, very careful. for example, the terrorist attack that, the terrorist tactics in the attack that occurred on the 23rd of october, 1983, against the marine headquarters in beirut as well as the french headquarters and the israeli headquarters, not many people really realize within a few minutes, the terrorists took out three major headquarters of three different countries, trying to bring peace and stability in lebanon and the like. and that attack was really conceived in iran. and it was funded with money and material through damascus and then into the western front in

beirut and carried out by the hezbollah. and nobody has even mentioned the hezbollah today, and yet, they were a very, very violent group and still are. in fact, we should have probably gone into them there in 1983 and gone to the bekka valley and deposited all of them right there. and ended that, but that's a different topic. the point i want to make sheer, is it was a very carefully coordinated attack. one of the things that i think we overdramatized is we made a hero out of bin laden. we aided and abetted everything that bin laden was trying to do to make him a hero. and by, by giving them broad play in the media and elsewhere and the like, and almost setting him up as somebody that couldn't be taken down and all that kind of thing, why don't we step back a little bit, and think about these things a little bit?

and i agree with with dr. lynch, we could do a lot more by operating out of this country and other countries around the world and like that. we don't have to be in these particular countries and regions to be very, very effective. and not just with special operations type of capabilities, but the whole host of political disciplinary capabilities that we can bring to bear. when we want to do ton our time hedule. in other words, we should drive, we, the free world should drive the whole thing. not, not bin laden or some other terrorist core activity. i've already said too much here. but i do think, i agree, we ought to come up with a different kind of a strategy for the long haul look ahead. and then work backwards, like you would in a campaign plan. you work backwards, by phases.

you work backwards in what money you can afford to put to this particular strategy and all that kind of thing. we've got to, and somehow we've got to harmonize not just the academic and research thought and all that and the military thought. but i don't know how you, i don't know how you pull together that crowd across the river. i'll leave that up to some of you academic types. but we really need to pull together. this is above politics and all that kind of thing and do what's best for, for the free world as we know it today. thanks. [ applause ] >> i didn't, i wouldn't let you go first, i thought -- no, no. >> those who don't know me, i'm ron kerr, i've been associated with a number of organizations over the years. but i think one of the things that came up here that i feel is

most important, is the need to pay greater attention to pakistan and be realistic about what it is. some of you will recall when we got to exploit some of the sites in afghanistan, what we found was of course, the evidence at tarnak farms and other places about long-term interests that al qaeda had. in other kinds of weapons, and other kinds of technology. not only that, people that supported that effort were in fact mostly retirees from the pakistani nuclear program. if the retirees felt it was important to support al qaeda, one might ask whether people currently in the program share those views in some manner. it's something i think we need to root out. we also need to understand that when we leave afghanistan, it once again becomes part of

pakistan's defense in-depth against what they consider their real enemy, india. it's healed a bit as a consequence of the mumbai attack. they talk once in a while now. but in fact, we're a pawn in the game they've been playing in terms of two nuclear-armed neighbors and what each might be able to get from the united states. depending on what our interests are in that region. so i think pakistan is the lurking devil in the background here. it's the place where more technology would be available to al qaeda and those who would emulate them. and it's very poorly controlled. it's as close to being a failed state, while still remaining a state as any we must deal with. so i just leave you with that thought. >> thank you very much.

>> professor, do you want to -- >> can i sit here? >> yes, can you sit there. use the mike. >> can you hear me? i'm sort of overwhelmed by how much i've heard. i think i'm civilian and i respect generals, i think general gray put it well. you know the title of this program is al qaeda quo vadis and the issue here is really american thinking, quo vadis. i have a friend in the back of the room, he uses the term "grand strategy" as did brzezinski. i think we have to have a grand strategy. the problem is this is not the cold war. i've heard reference to lennon, marx. i know they had one in the '20s in turkey. i think we have to disenthrall

ourselves from cold war thinking. what's interesting is there's so much knowledge, i really was overwhelmed today by all of my neighbors, how much they know. and yet, shareen hunter said, we don't know enough about countries and their histories. how do you take this objective requirement, the united states think big, and the brits talked about the great game. is it a great game or a lot of little games? i think that's the nature of the challenge. we had a very good program here on nigeria, it was referred to before. and it was interesting to listen. you have the local terrorist, i can't think of the name. and then there is some of al qaeda there and there's going to be i think that's the challenge. and i think as much as we heard today and god knows we heard a lot. i think most of us know more about this subject than ever before, we realie