we've beenúki talking about colleagues in chamber of congress with su port moving forward with the addministration on the hill and in cuba, generally. >> can i say something? a couple of times, it's been said this morning, go slow. i'm not sure what that means. that it seems to be ankf>ñ attempt to contrast legislation lifting the embargoicañ on the hill with regulatory activity. the president, the executive branch can go much further much faster than congress is going to go on lifting the embargo. there is zero possibility the embargo is going to be lifted. it's not going to happen. it's not one of these bills is going to come out of a committee. so, to the extent that i don't -- i feel it's almost an implication being made that those of us who favor regulatory action by the president and i

hypothesized a legacy project it. but i think we're getting pushed off into side panels about lifting the embargo on capitol hill right now. >> help me. i'm an optimist. and i believe optimism keeps us going on the right path. why won't a bill come out of committee. >> leave it to the room to$ @w judge whether a bill is going to come out of a republican controlled senate. >> let me follow up on that. i mean my."yq reading of the tea leaves is, as your conclusion, that congress is two views, some& strongly in favor of lifting some strongly opposed toq2n the president, the steps he's already taken. and, if you had to bet, i think you would bet where you've

placed your money, which is unlikely that there will be legislative action on this to either roll back what the president is doing or to advance policy further. my question to you is, in your initial remarks, you suggested that as a legal matter, the president has full, legal discretion toc to take very expansive steps. my question is do you believe that plitolitically, congress would not act if the president next month or at some point in his tenure took steps far beyond what he's already announced? >> i think there's a contradiction within congress. the majority of members of the house and senate don't privately support the embargo. they haven't for some years.

so -- but that doesn't mean that they're going to affirmatively support legislation to lift the embargo. as far as legislative interference with anything president obama may do in terms of cuba i think it's alsoów]áç for presidential candidates. i noticed both christie and paul were slow to react to what the president did. when theyo and christie said essentially nothing. so this tension between america is a forward-looking country, america that promoets trade globallynlno exists in congress and i think that will prevent direct interference with any presidential initiative on congress. but i think the simple reality,

including pact funding on capital hill makes that a long-term project. by no means do i want to dis disparage bills to lift the embargo. i think they're necessary. but, over time, it's going to happen. i don't want to go onto great a length here, but if the the historical prerogatives of kind of bilateral trade with cuba you can then see the embargo as a tidying up operation on capital hill. f9bqwsbr a frontal assault, but akbising reality that the embargo is more holes than cheese at that point, then i think a repeal becomes a much easier thing to accomplish. >> thank you.g'r

question over there and then we're going to move back here. y9 a e. >> well, thank you very much.-d i agree with bill. a really great panel and really great to hear all of your perspectives. >> can you -- yes? >> can you -- >> sorry, sorry, yeah. so my question: is a little bit of a historic perspective. i wonder if anyone has anyp.añ perspective of their comparing it to when the trade with vietnam and the miss steps there or not missteps and whether that informs your perspectives with cuba. or is it just the legislative and other controls in this case. thank you. >> others may have used one perspective on that.

when we normalized in vietnam, there was a fairly protracted negotiation in terms of what trade would be, how expropriation claims would be sorted out. vietnam was not a member of the wto. it's not a complete apples to apples comparison. but i do think vietnam and other instances suggest that there will be a multi-pronged negotiation and agreement of different issues to be sorted out, including, of course, claims. >> to john's point in 1985, this's when we first set up our cargo sales office in vietnam. and then we have 2005, that's when we got that one across the finish line. what we can see is we can certainly draw parallels between

what happened there and what we think will happen in cuba. and that is that we went in with zero investment. and now, if you fast forward to where we are today, we actually -- cargo has a very robust animal feed business. we import u.s. products into the vietnamese market. and, over that course of time we've also through our investments and through working in those communities, we've actually built our nearly -- our 70th school on the ground in vietnam. and so what we can say is that there's not only the power of trade, but there's the power of u.s. ÷uf of businesses to engage in what's known as commercial day diplomacy.) so, in the case of cuba, cuba is alkx i rátjt when we normalize relations, we would have to ensure that we would gain the same access in cuba that the other wto members have.

we would also have the pntr as part of that, as well. >> i would say two things about vietnam on the hill. that, to make it different from cuba, one is there was not an active pro-embargo vietnamese lobby, unlike cuba.!fb secondly, the senators brought in their desire for an approach that works on vietnam. it works the other way on canal hill. the cuban legislators bring a hearts and minds commitment to the embargo that tends to be deferred to, somewhat, by the hill. so it's sufficiently different. john makes a good point. the mechanics of the diplomatic:34.f negotiated claims expropriation claims and so on will be similar. but the dynamic on capitol hill

is going to be different, i think. >> i just have a question on specifics. do you all have any idea on licensing policy fh&d jttáñ like in the nitty-gritty? like in the aviation industry? we've got issues with the minimum emin minimus content, a plane going in and out of cuba that becomes a problem for boeing or air bus that's got a u.s. engine, et cetera, et cetera. with everything that's changing with the high-level policy, how soon could we expect perhaps, licenses granted or changes in the regulations on these specific issues. >> the administration has announced that they expect to

promulgate new regulars in the next few weeks. as a general matter, we're certainly going to see a loosening of the sanctions. >> yeah, i think commerce and treasury will release regulations in the next week or two or three. i don't know what to say is beyond the white house faction. except to say that the day min mus is contained in those. i do know, in fact, the policy changes. for example, general in licensee travel and requires a specific license for several of the categories to cuba. that will free up g +ñresources to at least speed the process along to other things. even if you still do require a license, you're going to have more resources rather than focusing on things specifically license and travel. >> when the cda was signed into law in 1992 the way authorized exports to cuba, there was nothing in the law that said

individuals could make sales calls to cuba. that you could take product to cuba as samples. and all of that was basically put into regulations over time and basically said hey, look, we want to go on a sales trip. now we want to put together some regs. he's going to do this expansive. we know that. it's not going to be restrictive. it's going to be expansive. but a lot of the nuance is going to come from lawyers and companies calling up ofat, calling up b.i.s. and saying hey, you didn't address this. can we get it addressed? >> that's actually a really important point. the distinction is there's going to be draft regs that come out. i think there's an expectation among government as generally with these things you're not going to get it entirely right the first time.

so there's going to be a rush of all of you and us to say hey, you need to get this right. fix it. and hopefully, they do. >> right behind you there. eric ferrari. the9aaal administration says that they will authorize cuban peso accounts but not cuban dollar acounts. does that present any problems? or is that going to be good .ujñ >> anyone have a list? >> it doesn't address our export financing issue at all. >> the problems of -- a gentleman called me the other day from the financial times, had been talking with american banks and european banks on how they view the financial provisions, which are limited. credit card services and direct correspondent banking relations in cuba.

and she said that the european banks seem more interested in trying to expand their presence in cuba in light of those regulations than the u.s. banks. we have a great problem right now that u.s. banks don't want to handle anything to do with cuba including even the counselor acount here to accept visa payments. it's a tremendouslyyf+ññ complicated problem that involves cuba on the terrorist list. i think it's probably coming off shortly. john kerry has been instructed to do a review in six months and i think everyone has concluded that he'll recommend that cuba be taken off the list. the patriot act even dodd-frank dodd-frank, money-laundering statutes make american banks

extremely risk o verse when it comes to countries that are under any kind of sanctions at all. i think we need more leadership from the administration treasury, in particular, the comptroller of the currency and among otherq.9 things, some scaling back of what's become almost a predatory instinct of the usz government to hit financial institutions for gigantic penalties for, in many cases, inadd ver inadd inadvertent errors of bookkeeping. bofac, the treasury department will go after that for millions of dollars in penalties. most with a $10 billion settlement. it's a change of culture in some

of the u.s. regulatory industries and, also, an attempt to deconstruct this thicket of laws and regulations that circumscribe u.s. banking services. >> over here on the right? my right? >> thank you. i wonder if i can get the panel to put themselves in a position or try to report to us. on another issue that we haven't gotten much into the sanctions.

>> how might they see it differently? let's say that as we peel off the various sanctions and we started working, we're likely to confront the same kinds of questions that they have. i wonder if there might be some general comments to help us sort of understand what this animal is that we're talking about. >> any takers? >> hey, dana. you did mention canada but they might be most relevant. i think foreigners inws:y cuba have had complicated history and relationship, you know."x canadian companies have had their property exproep rated and have not received payment. some of they xohid÷ challenges that they face were arctic lated here by the panel earlier on this morning, which is the attitude and the behavior of the cuban government mannerism and how they participate in trade investments. i think with canadalolh

huge focus on tourism. and you see canadian tourists going to cuba and you see focus on basic industry.rksañwbúr i know in the report in the press recently with ajent economies, if they sell cars, they sell busses, they sell transportation equipmented. there's some relationships in the biotech and pharmaceutical sectors between cuba and china. but i thinkñl everything is still nascent. so we did something in cuba yesterday when cuba said how behind the curve are u.s. companies if they're trying to get in with foreign companies. i don't think the race has started yet. there's no advantage to having been there for ten years. or, if there is, it's very specific to maybe a couple of sectors. but i think the growth in trade the growth in investment will come as the cuban economy grows,

as cuban attitudes start to change as things in the balance start to change. >> john not to put you on the spot, but do you have anything to add as far as what the experience ofax"yf other companies from other companies that haven't been able to deal with cuba, what their experience has been? >> over the years members of the organization were non-u.s. companies. and we've had government trade groups and that. most countries whether it's -- and i'm going to use bill dean here with caterpillar. i'll use the example of farm equipmented. so the u.s. let's say deetre and case and then you have foreign) ñ manufacturers, india and others. they've, over time, watched whattist companies have done and

what -- no one should think that u.s. companies don't know what's happening in cuba. many companies back in the '9d0s developed teams. companies developed substantial teams, some of the largest companies in the united states, teams of executives would get together quarterly, sometimes even monthly to develop strategies that were going on. some had containers sitting in miami ready to go with stuff. over time, it waned as cuba would do something politically to make it untenable to do something.h at the food show in 2002, many embassies from other countries that are in cuba panicked.

they saw at the food show that fidel castro was walking around. everyone was pointing and got an order. it was incredible. cuba saw a great benefit from it. and you had many of the embassies stacked there saying this is the end. private entities companies that they curried favor in europe and asked for investment, got investment, built things, developed businesses they then put those people in jail and put the companies out of business took the business over. so cuba is still going through a crisis identity. they're trying to figure out what the definition of success is. what the definition of wealth

is. how wealthy do we want people to become before we say it's too wealthy. again, not criticisms, but it all goes into the psyche. they will tell you when you go down there meet with ministers we'll -- we want everything. vú give us everything. but the question is, who's going to pay for it? and the foreign countries, they know that. but it's all about the money. the communications element of president obama's announcement, i don't know. i missed anybody down there saying that they wanted everyone to have ipads, smartrpa gmail,cisco receivableservers and routers and the rest of them. if you're a cuban and someone

from the u.s. comes with hardware, at some point, you're going to say how do we know it's not compromised before it arrives? or that it can be compromised once it gets here. you people don't have the greatest reputation when it comes to securing your hardware. not making a joke, but these are realistic business decisions that cuba%@,b is likely to continue to look at china and look at russia and brazil and other places where them political interests, where the governments will finance, unless it's f.a.s. or u.s.d.a. that's not going to happen here. they prefer to deal with government entities. so most of their existing trading parter ins who were owed a lot of money, cuba has all of this data. almost $14 billion. much of it hasn't been serviced. they're a horrible credit risk. horrible.zañ÷

so the countries that have already moved in there, they know that.üav:ry >> can i say something about rule-making? >> certainly. if you can be brief.taahv >> a lot of this depends on how the u.s. government is. there's alsprl sort of schizophrenia in cuba. they're a communist country. and raul castro periodically reaffirms that. however, of necessity are opening to the world more and more. so invieting these regs in allowing something like building/l'0 materials to be sold the administration should be realistic and realize in the first instance, it's going to go through a state agency. there's not going to be a home debow established ineh immediately, the forseeable future. the ugs+cçn e u.s. government should keep pressing. the u.s. business sector has

been held subrd%rkykf nant to many other claims to the attention of policy make rs when it comes to cuba. if you can aggressively firmly and over time use thisxéeñ on november 17 to expand opportunities in cuba,,i think they're there. all of these caveats are true, but c~m t)j begin with the reality of what it is and build on that. >> where's the microphone? if you could move back, while you're moving back to the woman behind you, we have a member of the press here and we haven't heard anything from the press so i'm going to give you an opportunity with the microphone. just speak loudly and swro deuce yourself. >> let's assume everything goes well. the d.o.j. has been very active in enforcing the anti-bribery

laws, there's a lot of soes, obviously, in cuba. so what's the environment down there in terms of anticorruption riszing for companies that do actually get involved. and is there a possibility that you make, say, sales of $50 million in cuba but then you get a fine of a hundred million from the d.o.j. for bribery, as well. >> for those who couldn't hear the question was regarding fcpa and anti-bribery and other laws as u.s. company moves into cuba at some point 234 time when that is permissible. what will the risk scenario be. rob earth, you eluded that earlier. i don't know if you want to restate the points you had made. >> >>. >> i can only recite what i've read. there's an anticorruption track down in cuba that's been going on for about a year or two. it's implicated some mid to

high-level cuban officials. it's also, because the only hard currency sector of the economy are foreign businesses, that anti-corruption initiative has landed very heavily on some english and canadian companies.v@oh their executives have been imprisoned. i don't know where, quiet, that's going. i think their greatest risk at the moment is being pulled into a cuban anticorruption drive, rather than probably having the justice department knocking on your door. question? yes, right next to you. >> good morning. i'm interested in knowing what do you think is going to happen with the awards issued by the foreign claims settlement commission? who is going to paye/ru them? and do you have to pay them

before the relationships with cuba? >>. >> robert, now that you might have a view of this, i do. robert? >>. >> just very quickly. the claims with thef the cer claims claims pryg3v u.s. corporations with interest, john, correct me i think are close to $7 billion now in principle and interest, $2 billion in interest. cuba doesn't have the hard currency to remotely come close to paying those. but the claims are top heavy. the top 25 companies represent approximately two-thirds of the total value of the awards. those companies.#g÷o so if some kind of disposition of those claims can be made the rest can be workedóúd2 out over time through some kind of lump5tf1y sum agreement payable over time.zrql how those will be resolved i

think, companies should approach innovatively and flexibly and consider their claims of cuba as the basis for reentry into the cuban economy perhaps through a debt equitypafuswap, perhaps the recovery of theq!ñ property that currently fits their business it's going to be complicated. companies that sit back and wait for the government to knock on the door and hand them a check, i think are going to fair quite poorly in this. john? >> i would just add that, you know, the short answer is we don't know how that will resol ef itself. i do feel quite confident in saying what won't happen is that the claims holders will just turn the page and forget about their claims.

i don't think, as we've seen in other instances, there will have to be some resolution, the u.s. government certified those claims are now worth more than $7 billion with interest. there will be some resolution of that.áñ)qz3g >> there was a comment made that many republicans in congress are motivated by-9 the cuban authority in florida. frankly, the anticastro

community does very little for ña)/"tr# vast majority of republican members of the house or senate. ranking file republicans typically looked at members of the florida&g;t delegation who they personally like and personally respected and consider experts of latin american policy. who made the cuba issue a personal issue for themselves. i think it's important we understand that. my question is it's been noted that much of the business that has been done has been done from a stay-at-home compan3 what has been the%i)ñ experience of our european and canadian friends from a business perspective where they've had success stories. and then, also, what's been their experience where they privately provided credit.ij6iz >> soñ÷fcó i can't speak specifically to any particular european company. we can just look at the

statistics and what we are seeing in the food and agriculture communities that the europeans are being successful in sales to the european import. like any business, you don't sell without getting paid. certainly, we have seen an up tick in sales. over time, they're working out those financing arrangementeds that are beneficial to them. >> just a comment on the pac on capital hill. it gives on a bipartisan basis, i've watched, over time approximately half the black congressional caucus, which is wholly democrat, vote pro-embargo. the pac gives very artfully. debbie wasserman-schultz who is in charge of theí p committee for democrats at risk, is a

principle recipient of some of that pac money. so i didn't mean to suggest republican opposition to lifting the embargo is solely because of pac funding. that works both ways. when a bill was brought up to try to lift the travel ban, it couldn't get out of a democratic-controlled committee in a democratic-controlled house. so i think that's a testamentf>apk to just howru has been on capitol hill. >> i think very quickly on most european companies have had collection issues with cuba. and many of those companies have had government entities within their respective countries guarantee -- provide credit guarantees. and almost in all cases debt

has to be rolled over, renegotiated or written off. >> time for one last question way in the back. >> i'm ryan raney from inside u.s. trade. i just want to go back to the credit purchases issue and just some of the priorities of the new u.s.-cuba coalition for agriculture agriculture, generally. icñ there's a lot of talk about how some of these changes don't have to be made legislatively. but i was under the impression that allowing credit purchases might be one of those changes. so i wanted to know what authority does the executive branch have to make any change to credit payments with regard to cuba and also, more broadly, what is the agriculture coalition going to do with regard to congress? will there be bills that they're

working on with members of congress letters of public campaign. i just want today see if you might be able to speak to that. thank you. >> so we would agree with you on credit side. the announcemented can only take us so far. in fact moving from cash up front to cash upon exchange of title, may offer a few extra (áq"it. so, for example, we're not allowed to put a ship in the queue until we've secured either a third country letter of credit or we have cash in hand. what the announcement has done has allowed us to perhaps put the shipping cue get the process moving load the vessel ship the vet essel at which point this is a legal title case, that's when there needs to be cash in hand.

certainly, our need is the same as yours. definitely limiting any private financing, et cetera. it will take an act of congress for us to be able to take advantage of flexible financing terms. to your answer on what we plan to do the answer is yes,ot?÷ yes, yes, yes and yes. we certainly do have recommendations on what the bill should look like. it's very clean. and i wanted's about a page and a half. and that would overturn all of the restrictions and work toward a pathway of legalization. and we will certainly be going up with a consistent voice and having conversations. again, we don't define this as a republican-democrat issue. we're kind of the of the mind that it's bipartisan and, to rob ert's point, i'm glad to hear that you agree. the bulk of the members of congress would tell you that they do not agree with keeping the embargo in place. all we need to do is provide the

information, the flexibility, have the conversation and surface the reality. and, quite frankly, we do believe that4 úz the story won't begin telling itself. so we're hoping to serve as a catalyst. but, again, i'm an optimist.i cz we'd like to see this in 2015.l/"sñ >> unless anyone has a burning comment, i'd like to close this. i want to thank you for your participation. i hope you have an unthawed day out there today. thank you.1mqhlñ= [ applause ] >> on the next washington george howard schmidt will join us and will talk about the white house's efforts to prevent cyber attacks. .

then, lee goodman discusses new rules and the future of political speech online.j&úsx and later, walter bumpus, president of association of community colleges, on the administration's plan to guarantee high school garage waters free tuition at community colleges. washington journal live every morning and you can join the conversation on facebook and twitter. >> hekboy are some of our featured programs for this weekend. c3?(

good afternoon, ladies and gentlemen. we want to thank you for joining us today. on behalf of our president and ceo, mr. mike swetnum and general al grey the 28th commandant marine corps we're pleased to have you here today. potomac is celebrating its 20th year in existence. we usually look at policy issues that are associated with that. we also delve into some innovative areas and host events like this that allow returning commabvpy"uz speak and to speak about what they did on their deployments.#di$ that brings us to brigadier

general dan hue who's with us here today. a scholar. a trainer and a warrior. first of all as a scholar, he got his master's from college of naval command and staff in new port, rhode island. and he also was national security affairs fellow at the hoover stut in stanford. as a trainer. lieutenant colonel as a commander, hadf infantry training schools in the east coast.jpñ he was also a trainer and was the commanding general with the marine corps on the west coast. as a warrior, both[ofafloat units and, of course on ground with his efforts here that he's going to talk about. was the operations officer for the 26th view and that bill is in peace ora÷ war, you couldn't imagine the scope. dan, you probably have some scars from that tour. he's going to talk to us today about his time in afghanistñ!ycz

i &háhp &hc% he was the last marinelxyñ regional command 234 southwest afghanistan.c please join me in welcoming dan hue. [ applause ] >> hefgs was the commanding officer in the fourth regimen. >> thank you, sir, for the kind introduction.s ñ it's always great to see you. you[ look great and hope 2015 is as good as all of your previous years. general, mentor of mine, as well. great to see you. and all the digsstinguished guests. i think i saw colonel paul hito in here. when i was a young major in my way around, great to see you as well, too. i thinkáwa the lectern here.

i don't prefer this way, but i think my voice4r%6 will carry away number one, i got my major accompanies me and keeping me out of trouble on this tour of post deemployment briefs. i apologize. we were going to come to the potomac institute in september, right on the heels of the united states and we also had the afghan leadership that we brought back from the amp side.32f he was a=hnçí ñ border police chief. for several reasons. one, we wanted to thank them for steady partnership when we were in the southwest. we wanted to capture history with the national security forces and wanted to expose them to the larger dchlt c. and university down at marine corps university, as well, too. so we ran out of time hosting them. but we wanted to ensure we got

back here to address some of the otherúqywç audiences that were interesting. i've never been a0l6s real fan of post deployment brief. what i did on my summer vacation, what we did is more germane from a historical perspectiveá but i think the potomac institute and what you charter pursues is very important. we had59 some time early today to speak with cna and then with the stut of peace and(d up with you all today. what i have is a couple slides and i think hope has been exposed to a couple too. i e it really provides a backdrop of what i think is the most value-added. i hope there will be a dialogue at the conclusion. i'll try to blow through some of the slides asmx quickly as possible because i know we're under a time constraint until 1600.

the reason we use this as part of his slide deck as wtl3&"ujjy i think those who are familiar with the campaign specifically southwest and the marine coalition down in the southwest. it was a coalition and those national instances represent all of the members &rx of the team. it truly was a coalition until the very end. it was when we preached during our work up to not just the advisors, but to our conventional forces that our sole purpose in life was to set conditions for the afghan national security forces to not jst lead, but full security responsibility and the 2014 when b é;ujut going to transition resolute support. so as great marines always do, you're surrounded by even better marines.

young marines from the combat came up with this. it's where we were in the shadows and they were in the lead. when we showed up and they took it all. next slide. >> >>. >> what i tried to do here, we tried to build a brief from macro to micro.h :o and this encapsulated quite a bit here. what you'll see is we came in in february. and if you look at the bottom -- excuse me. tlvgsx+>ñ operation steelb had already started to execute. that took us up to june and then we came with the horizon. it went by very fast.

so flexibility was important from an operational capability. what we highlighted here were some of the major milestones that you'll see. but most, from an afghan perspective, was the national elections in april. we anticipated there was going to be a runoff. not sure when that was going to happen. there was some discussions it was going to happen right away.ácy what we had was the logi2m(lj where the election runoff was just going to take longer. it just happened to fall right at the middle of the summer fighting season that we had historically been accustomed to. obviously, the inauguration was assigned bsa.dwyns all of these blue triangles represent where we were. if you didn't believe it because you read it in>sh the media, i saw it firsthand. thek afghans were in if lead in

the south.d&xu but if you look at all the previous iterations did to set the conditions for them to take the lead in june, 2013 and then transition to where we got there in february and prepared for the elections for the eventual full security responsibility they had lifted off in the south. they were being very successful down there. mkm then we actually task force, which was the british contingent, and that's what these blue boxes represent. they're the rotations that the brits had traditionally done. as you can ccwsee, in 2006, they were with us from the very beginning until the end. and then this box here represents all the coalition members and when they ended up

rations our focus was getting rid of a layer of commandv,% where he became subordinatet3>wfe. those individual lmts worked for me in the relationship. but, more importantly really when we startedq)"zñy after the initial election, we transferred the fourth brigade, which was the youngest brigade of the before the election runoff. and i think that's something that people miss. for the initial elections we were there, and we were co-located. so we could monitor what was going on from the perspective of the elections. at the same time, minimizing operation. it really was afghan led and planned organized, an bvuq election.

so we lifted off and then as you can see, when you talk about where they are today that really happened during our tenure. and what this lays out is really a historical perspective of when we arrived back in thesaa'!ursq frame set the conditions that we knew that the surge was going to come. that eventually coming in at that time frame there was few afghan nationalist security forces in the ao. the general took a brigade and that was the foundation of the 215 corps which now has four brigades. you'll see the size of their capableties. and then, the similar thing with the afghan national police. when you talk about the afghan national police, those are multiple pillars.

when we started woff, in some areas in the southwest you would have a 10-to-1 ratio from coalition members to afghan partners. specifically in transition, it was the reverse.tzkñ in military terms we werehñ supportive force to them early on.. vñ #s and they truly were the supporting force for us when we lifted off. when i showed up there there were two lines of operation we were focused on. one was security force assistance and the other was called forced posture. forced posture was the perspective of remaiduation retrograde and all good order.at8 they were disz cussing about making a third one about force protection being a security i was an matly against that because i honestly believe it's a continuing action that we do in the marines.ú so it was always the foundation of everything we did.

but those were the two lines of operation.#3me as you can see, it's quite a success story. it covers two provinces. at one point in the campaign, it was all part of the rc south. recently led by the germans the army south that went from the canadians to the brits to the u.s. and then you hadrr(r is italians. again, as you look and see the size of the battle space, it's a pretty significant amount of terrain there.÷çyf%hqñ

although not as densely & densely populated.sar those would be your left right here. these are the leadership of the civilian military apparatus in the province or what they call the zone now because it e2m encompasses botha&dñilf he was also dubbed the zone commander. so the provincial police chief was his deputy. so you have all the pillars working together. they worked very closely together during the elections. we'll get into all the stuff you read in the press and what, ú#"q my view x was some of thdp=i

inaccuracies in the press. and then, the (mu national director of es ]u+k which is their intelligence structure and then the other pillars between the amcop commander, the border police commander and then the alpbñ v%t commander that is not shown on here.xvx but when you look at the task kill here it's truck e structure that's p0ae for, whether they can fill it or not, based on recruiting and attrition. what's assignedédq is what shows up on the roles right now. hand at any given daúb&w 0&j it's also things that they call drop on request. what we would say is an unauthorized absence. they drop them from the roles and the dates have changed. it used to be 30 days, now i think it's 60 days.r/

on a positive note, a lot of them come back. 70% of people come back after they've come off for whatever reason why they didn't return on time. but the total the on hand, that's a significant amount of combat power infz the a.o. to provide security for the region. and then you have the very small, mostly border police. nimrose is a model of self governance and security throughout the region. the other thing that's important to high light is the border. this jst gives you a per spectivity eive of the insurgency as we saw here. what's important when you look at talking about the highway one that goes all around the country, but specifically from the east and you comesd

way through alaska and up through the west there. that's key terrain from the perspective of the ansf. and, also, from the i recall sur jenss, too.ño6ñ what's critical for the insurgency is up here is northern sangit. and what it represents from the ta welcomes iban.ql a lot of the leadership are from the region up there. there was a monetaryn5 because of the elicit trafficking that happens up there. it's very important because you see some of the major facilitation around. but if you put all the facilitation around from the west and the south southwest is really a sieve for elicit aid coming in and out of the country, as well, too. when you look at itrf perspective of we saw the

counter insurgency relating from the north to the central to the south. the best way to describe it is good, better and best. the best because the south, again, based on them taking thex lead and the cross pillar coordination between between the district governor and the mayors and the security forces whether it's a police organization orbnv=ñ a neighborhood organization. but, when you talk about it being important the reason issue and down in southern portion proximity there's a lot of illegal mining that goes on#d$ñ down there. the two of them are very depen dent on each other. it's the province. asé7÷c you can see, when you look at this, what we saw this year was

no different than any previous year from the ttps and the objectives of the taliban. they're number one objective is to make sure that the maindlztá to the population. they're a viable alternative. the second thing iszk a perspective of a áç io and relevancy to the insurgency itself and the other thing we saw from a strategiclwclg mistake when the april 5th elections happened for whatever reason and there's things between resource shortfalls, between fracturing of the senior mid level leadership to the wait1úñand see mentality of the leadership. they váñbg failed to act.x#17r

the security forces wereg xssk+ñ have proactive shaping during the winter fighting season which really wasn't a winter fighting season because it was pretty mild and the keinetics were a lot higher. theybxsmx were very proactive executing repeatedly. they established the security that facilitate such a successful election on th1 z 5th of april. i would also say i think the taliban themselves are probably going through a decision point right now whether'c+ traditionally they've been a millitary organization and you n the peace and reconciliation 0#fúmmthey become political as well or both. that had a lot to do. next slide. now i'm going to go real quickly into the summer fighting season which attracted a lot of media. as you see, again this portion

of the campaign of what we're#$bz focusing on and really after!dze the first elections we had to focus on retrograde and reappointment. i always said it wasúh going to be conditions 8sffvbased. when you look at our operational contract and we had people and in infra infrastructure. not knowing what they're actions and capabilityies would be during the summer fighting season. whether they would have the confidence and initiative to continue to take the lead toa transition to responsibilitiesvcg and because of the concern about the abandonment there and those things and whether the green on blue was somewhat of a7jn÷ concern for the leadership and then the bottom piece was the redeployment of we also said it was condition base and keep as much combat power to give us this operational flexibility and give

ijc the capacity if he]az3 to. got down to a time base and laws of q?:[ñphysics. we were balancing that oneoyzñ a regular basis.4v when you looked at the northern spine, the facilitation route and saw the ones coming up from the south here, it takes a little bit of time to workz)xyx its way through and down through to kandahar. what you see here is the river valley. there's a traditional stages area there that comes offief4@. it's really no maf vb land.

you see a lot of aid coming down here to where they have a traditional crossing point that cuts down the traffic time.]c&mh@r(t&háhp &hc% we knew this was gieng to happen up in here. the afghans continue to be pro-active and continued to go up and clear. they wanted to set the stage because of the pending aannouncement who the president kc 2 was going to be and the concern to make sure they were set for 15 as it went for into rsm and knew we were going to lift off. general had the adage that when we were talking about that he said that we understand we're rsm and what the continued relationship partership brings. if the afghans fail in 14 are and 15 there's noánwh need to think about 16 and 17.d$ad to balance this ju)urjz to full security responsibility making sure that

they had most importantly the leadership and the confidence to know that we weren't abandoning them. we wereswm( transitioning on a dailyc basis. the points i was talking about in my intro is right here. up until this happened we had continuity of leadership. he was there when general nickelson was there hen he came in. in the course of our year we had three h4ñ brigade commanders were smonl responsibility for northern helm portion. he was relieved for coming in. he was responsible for the elections and when the94ñvu)jt seasons started you heard about

helman, he went home on leave and refused to come some could argue whether it was his fault or not. he was the onexw< that held accountable. he had time in kandahar as well had been there for quite a while. he was very instrumental. it's been my experience that human network is some of the best out there. he have very good. he knew all the players from both the formal players that

were part of the government to the informalv kandahar into helman which is extremely important. the two are so interconnected. d the a and a is6. the best in my humble opinion maybe subjective. people that have been there probably validate probably the best military capability they have.÷ú qdf&z if do you look at stability in the future the police have to be professionalizedfwh and they're really the key to success. u ideal6lliñ because of his affiliation. what described the situation occupy there is the tribal

dynamics. he could drive up there by himself in his vehicle with no concerns. hebób7 knew all the one of the pretty prominent. there's two of them. one issf he has both formal and informal power. what defines it is the criminal

nexus up there. this personv4áñ was very important. he was on the short perspective andhgb what was defunddd what was defunddefuddling to us is he was moved out beforeáá elections. he wasy put in. favored for personal and professional reasons. he didn't last long. he got through some of the summer fighting season but because of the infectiveness of the police he was replaced. probably notr to be the0ñsñykycñ police chief.

hopefully he will bpe appointed a position of continued increased authority. in my view and having see[6÷ any of the leaders over there i think he's one of the good ones we've been affiliated with. this shows you what's going on. shdhad rumors of 8,000 insurgents out'i of fighters. we set up a lot of surveillance up there. traditional fighters that we saw&aa that you heard this term out a1g area fighters foreign. they're talking about; district. the afghans were very good to get out the information and articulate what was going on. when this fighting started and the rumorsnfóm started going about

this huge influx of insurgents the did i have pillars started )vcv straight up their individual chains whether it's moi or mod from the leadership straight to the president. as a result thep reporting facts thatch facts.t z we couldn't even go up there to help them%q"h because we didn't-&l

troops on the (?ground. it will be high risk forxs2o us because of the capacity thath)qo cf1 o were offwgj3ñramp. it could be detrimental to the campaign and we knew they could# do it themselves. they did it'&c>r themselves and really came > to the point where they had to for the first time prioritize and reallocate resources. what they ended up doing was taking apt couple of acts and pushed them0@!ú in.h)66d they took some fromf÷ 207th. they broughtd/d in añ battalion. they did it all on their own. when i look at the summer fighting season this year it was a seminal event. from the 2ójgovernance power. two, in our perspective

southwest even with this political turbulence here they were able to maintain stability by themselves. as part of that responsibility transition since we would be the first rc shut down. it was supposed to be 31 in december. general told me can i make it, get everybody out by 31 october. we had clarity instate plus the fact that with all the partnering we had done in southwest and the emphasis of the coalition about building institutional or /"q%=9m where our motto was the sustain and be able to co50p power into the7'?h battle space we felt comfortable about the8+@c accelerated time line. everybody trying to get out at the same time was not feasible. we were task to come up with a

concept which we came up 5ñsñhy we wanted to do our concern was the distance betweenx[ kabul and helmand. before they had÷[flz advisors to do this.x we built a cell with four or five members. we put them up in kabul in september. we put the two interpreters up there.ofj all these individuals had served with the core and the police. the leadership knew them. they knew the ,-xinterpreters. they would have means of communication viatúm cell phone or tactical teams. thøu1 be thet)ñadvocate. they would make sure the

processes were working. we need to make sure they can sustain themselves and resource themselves from kabul. we built the cell and it shows where thetao theater 7ñwas. where it went to and where it will go to. kabul attack north west south and east. it will continue to evolve into any long term partnership. relationship with afghanistan is important to the international community and stability in that region. i think that's what rsm sets stage for. it's a decade of ] and partnership that we talked about in the tokyo and frame workp

i think the london conference also revalidated recently. when we lifted off we looked at three areas. it's a development operational capabilities wherec dñ!fd it was afghan support and afghan stainable. we're talking about the regional core battle school. this is where the basic war training centralizedumrp7. npoi development program of instruction. the training happens right there.7 individual progression and training. before that was coalition t:psvled. when we lifted off in june on that perspective they were doing it allqzk by v this is the example of general right there leaning over and working with one of the young7>nó soldiers on land navigation.

the other aspect is the medicalró capability they needed. w!j(v"uz make sure the same time frame that any infrastructure was sustainable as wecokm too. those were the institutional aspects of it. they needed the airfield being able to reach kabul but more importantly repatriotization. thatez multiplier. they have a means to do that. they didn't have to travel by ground. when you talkbe&áé about operational came blts we'reb/é the integration of error which the coordination between the 9 fmoccr.

then when you talk about security normalization we're talking about they had a layer of security model. we wanted them to not be check point for some areas where they needed to have check points. some of those insteadhñ of being specific an afghan localu@j1ñ police station :a÷ or afghan national police station or police afghan army check point. consolidated.aó building with a" capability to deal with somem! of these insurgents. we want to rationalize some of the check points and give them ad'!!jrw-bñ maneuver capability. we wanted to normalize some operation cycle. we wanted to make sure they kept

this district and the=j)l surers where they brought in:m then46?s leadership, the elders and 0v looked at issues from the governance. that's where we built. as you canv'h=ñ see these the critical capabilities thatdz we÷jh talked about. i think this is really what's lost on everybody is the challenge in order toí 5÷ %ñ4 ! get everything í:zout. we've been there 13 years. this was%bzn h)"operational contract i talked about. the friction that went on daily between what we needed to do and the external frictions. that's 28 kilometers, a fence line. that's the outer perimeter.

the yellow is the afghan base. the green here is what we call-ñ the green zone. there'sz"ñ a 12,000 foot runway right there. for those that i'm sure there was a lot of interest in the attacks when they came through the wire was over in this area. you had the brits that had this portion of the security and the marines had the remainder. the afghans had this portion. to lift off is that again, whatevers$3 we're going to be good75#7p stewards of the taxpayer's money is number one secure so the afghans it was sustainable and sachfe. it could impacted the narrative7 of the coalition. we didn't want the,vxfñ taliban to occupy itaa5ç because the impact on the campaign as well. we thought that we wouldlaarñ build

this green zone for two reasons.qoc we needed that as critical infrastructure. weíó!÷x needed life support and the c2 notes. at the end of the day we ended up remediated quite bit of this. we built internal perimeter so if they decide to go to that they can. they elected to keep the whole perimeter and reduce as you can see quite a bit of infrastructure to them. we3af whether it was transferring buildings or equipment. it was a piece we needed to reset from tbá

youspañk talk about transfer 4]:?m enc:j#xáq f bases pretty significant endevour throughout theooo battle i i think ther!hf/ 25 now in all of afghanistan that's still out there that belongs to thej÷ coalition. that will transition as well too. if you lookqqtr at c nn 17-17 to get out of there. the la5x tactic e+cqwithdrawal. because of the uncertainty in

this and whether they could do '@r(t&háhp &hc% this, we didn't change our en security. up until theîh#the end of operations kmoinceremony on theju 26th.h that's where we broke down our aircraft. this was quite a s!kfñ story. i will tell you gotqw÷ accustomed to. it was built for 2,000 people in 2006. when we came in in 2008 and surveyed it and showed up in 2009 it was to build a compounds large enough for 25000 in+cdt anticipation for the surge. in reality it became just if the 40,000. expedition standards it was7d(5

at first but then we0o,ñ realized this is our bread and butter. we took a log cap service of almost 2500" i_q being generous. it's a little larger. reduced it down to 600 people using all uniform servic to republican forcei5g!t about themszj$s supporting us we retrograded a lot ofcgd8g our heavy stuff.wñl were we using some of theq#= commercial vehicles and they were loaning the gear we brought them to rangers in order to have mobility up ina 3 political transition in a military transition0[a there are challenges out there. there's no doubtó8 i'm confidence based on first hands experience of watching them and now sittingzwçb back herejiysk reading the paper every jpqñday, i have.rñw .f

served in afghanistan on what's happening.é i'm verylç8ç happy that he's announced his ministers and i'm your curious to see what's going to happen. i sawgjycñ&ú they executed first hand for the elections and how after we lifted off it was bit of a growing payne when we disconnected ourselves and they were used to us for them to ask for help. i say what they did when we didn't give the help and i've$mqñ seenyq9n kwhapwhat they have done since we left. it's still 5[q;8ñ i'm squinsconvinced the effort we

put inx@ l 1q#'ñ?s[ has been successful.u=kj theobú_qp& issue6(b2w i think, which will carry the day as how this government does and in taking advantage of some of the development projects because when you look atykw÷ the three lines of operation that we focus#'eq ñlb n, think the developmentcen pút pieces probably the area that (y probably need the most emphasis in here. this is just the backdrop. it's really just a tribute to everyone that served there from the0=$ñ military4 you see all the!úarw t walls and ther memorial there for all the fallen comrades and the colors of all the nations that participated. i truly believe;f)z÷ transition is a:r q sign of s in this case for usglvo it was a success at this stage of the campaign. >> i askmg=0s you to raise your hand.

i'llm we'll give adequate timenñ'( to respond. >> great the see you again sir. you've had one of your things:wu, that said organic aviation integration. i was at the$é" hearing for general camp be, one of the issues thath/÷ came up with is several9iuhd senators want to shut off mi-17 qq w(port.2r h]=hé8cúç the comment that both general dunford madeznho6@pl and campbell made is if you shut down theq support not only the new aircraft but the parts almost catastrophic. your comments on that. >> from personal experience there andf1m!ñ also understanding the?krv

topography out there mobileity is key for that you are success. you look at the enterprise it's(vuit((sv one of the things weñufñ mv neglected. in southwest if i had been there for the beginning>o back based on(l areas i ro would have really pushed for was a role to hospital because it gives&xpç the confidence to their shouldouldiers that they will get taken offer thec battlefield. thaths a huge success story. i would havey the aviation enterprise there. i think what happened is we were pgj so focus and victims of our own experiences and went to our comfort zone. the first part of the campaign we focused on the army. the key to long term stabi! e=gsiaó" upport ofw the police. at someu there's still more maturity that needs to help. i think there's too many

different pillars out=óçb÷0[yñ there where they can consolidate for efficiency and unity of command. when-0a4ç you talk about the aviation piece it's critical. from assault support till they had the mobility andñ0ú in some of the capabilitiesb÷ they bring because it was ther@ñ case for us.$2? even if you had the authority9v support them. it became very challenging.8a@ therefore, having mi-35s ore- mi-17 withóz], 20 multi-mission platf/&x3 is one of theboiñ reasons i think they're areas. i hope we continue them that aviation support. >> next question. >> good to see you. >> nice to see you. >>iñeñ some if mq%9

pardon mywu confirm reports about the jld resident of i wanted your take on that and howf that might affect stability, how it might affect the otowço cf1 o balances of power in the region and if you're aware of any kind of i.s. presence at anyç point while you were out there?l]ç >> i'll start off with this. yousóii leave afghanistanvrñ one day and your information is

itpgç' happening in the east. in the article you referenced edd i saw[ that's as m%qg as i know. i don't think that's the case that there is isis in afghaniñúa again, i don't know. it's34z ot a very good answer. i wish i1ñ%d could be more:?bns definitive.h@aá÷/& >> based on your experiences dowq:6éla you see áñ largeknj% changeskx8gñ based vú8t onlessd on lessson's learned such as changing the tour length or focusing on different lines ofú(?s

operation such as development as you werejñç> it's a dilemmar"-]áuiut in. we're normally the first ones on the scene. we're asked to do somesedñ things that are not in our 1>8lane. i think there was a civilian surge that didn't turn out to be the surge that we anticipated. i think as we went into transition some j z of those organizations from the 2jqgñ interagency that ilpcb thought would be in the fore front would be there when we] because of security some validti)q concerns from their organization at the very end the pr team that i hadr0# lifted off early. not really of much usew=?÷=é" sitting there.&-hlwwjqwå+lp the rp was reduced to one person. he was ú@raeffective not because

and capability based on that. i think when you look at this, it's the whole of government. the whole of international government and who is responsible for that to make sure that you're committed not just to the termlúv. but the+( campaign. that's one thing. i think one of the areas in development and i'm not sure just the statement of fact and from what my understanding of it i was there in 2001 when wec lifted off. we lifted off and.=~ob÷ transition. i saw a perspective from the afghans of a lot of hope in future opportunity. i think from an internationa;c=fzi &háhp &hc% development perspective that one time they tal3i about 10 billion to 15 billion that they thought they were going to get but they got 3 to 4 billion which is still ao)zñ lot of money. a lot of the money/m%u

off. q !have venture capitalists and expats that came in and made all the people never benefitted. when you talktl about just afghanistan a;:

that was talk and about. i think most5d0z understand that n too. it gets back to ways and means and each",w country's perspective of what'só@pe vital interest to them. it's:/l a challenge. i think we're headed down the right path and hopefully thee'[;h commitments that were made and revalidated in london. everyone thinks about the troops on the ground. that seems to be the discussions but what partoknp is nato's commitment.nuyañ the freedom sentib it's the long term commitment to afghanistanú c8÷ the%lb2 lñp? monetary aspect is very important to the afghans. they will work out their differences. that's where i think some of the;mñ

gap is.fpccytue17 @r(t&háhp &hc% >> you mentiot0ush earlier on that you taught the taliban was at a where they would be a military organization orxzqpp maybe go political. we haven't seen in this last end of thezs see much sign of them running for office or anything like that. what did ytb meanefó d-a$( see there's a possibilityswó)eìáhp &hc% of a negotiated9t end to this thing? >> i think all -al&)gency and some kind of political accommodation that's the fact of the matter when you go through that process.0 i &háhp &hc% that's what the peace and reintegration processóí is for. thij and i read that at one point they were talking about he was going tot7 give three ministry positions to taliban and he was going to÷ñg÷ make the southern

afghanistan provential governors were going to be taliban. i thm4gu they came oubfx and said that's not true.í(#c&sr1ñ+>3'v3zi+ zeñ :$di what they were preaching and what the loca,17yi o 7÷ executeingxhwx there was a disconnect. to me that means there may be some fracturing. as long as the momentum continues and the international community continues to upholdg

mutual frame work, i think that will be bad for thei;w u >> in central government as compared to the+x would it make sense in the future to work more closely with3yç the tribes or will this power and also the loyalty of they:-d cf1 o peopler=r0z>4!os go over from theñ',/ tribewmiry tob< the province and to the nation./zxwñi(i l.ip >>zg< when you talk about tribes

and leadershipl,s those will all go into consideration i believe, based on who becomes the governor and some of the civilian leadership in the ministers. when you say negotiation with the tribes, gone up to northern lñáehelmand. the governor was doing this his own.(qh/%- he would go up there.%'" he hadá

a lot of those elders have a5ró of influence in those areas. i think the afghan government has done a good job in the military unlikex/qwr we did in iraq to make sure that each ethnic groupeh2r was represented. need to have a more educated fort not just in the military but from children. at the same time frame in this very conscious about the tribal affiliations and where they are connected in formal and informal. i think they've done a good job. that's one of the challenges4 w43@5ñ=gy z┌] when somebodyzzyeyk becomes king he mains or blinds his siblingsw so nobody can taketf@+ power from0

him.5"k.÷ that was challenging tobhalz make surec some of the people they havet [ appointed now opla.w they have ties to some otherz that's all of afghanistan. to go'kéñ directly to the tribes and circumvent in the lower and upper house i think would be gskzq detrimental. i think there's got to be dialogue but to makec just for that it's got to look at what's best nation.$jñmxy>x >>;c@6

that will be reasonable to maintain any kind of tempo as they go]ñ forward. are the resources there to be able to deliver the resources that will"> be necessary for them to maintain that kind of activity. >> i lv7] the resources are definitely there. we provided the resources. i think the infrastructure in most cases are there. it's the culture mentality. they'r•3m horders just like a lot of developingy añ countries. when they haveñq, something they tendd?!4ñ to hoard and not distribute it like we would do.ûçmygiijó lo when youj, leadership that's been on the

pointy end of the spearunt to keep their hum vee goingpi# on need more ammunition,wjqñ that they're not getting it from the úp7ñchrd central government.xçú:÷oñéz1bo.twxkñçlfño< &z probably is not completely suitable for the afghans. i think it's evolving. we realize that. that'sé herbal functions sfa, security forces that you saw onuihu that slide are so important to where you actually get theeh4j supplies and you are projecting x it's notl[íc'it's there instead of when you run out of it. i think8v$) have the capability. they do have they have the infrastructure. it's a culture mind set that we need to change. there's been a lot of emphasis

from the coalition especially as we go through this to make sure they take the resourcess's and get of hoard j(çg somenbé7rás not just hoarding. we're working through that as well. i want to thank you all for attending. c- c-span i want to thank for covering. thank you for your service and thank you for coming here today. >>'atte i want to thank you on behalf of the marines and otheri6k! coalitions and pm most importantly our afghan counterparts forbzothe support provided. it's treme fs on a daily basist[()pttáhp'd just the moral support we receive not just from our families but the larger americanie population. thank ñyñeçyou, again.dí<

[ applause ]iz thursday the head of the strategic command discuss us. live coverage2t begins at 9:30 on

c-span3. the c-span cities tour take book tv and american history tv on the road traveling luvsu u.s. cities to learn about their history and literaryaçé life. this weekend we partnered with comcast to wheeling, west virginia. >> i wrote7 y these books "the wheeling y"hifamily". there's two n9eábe volumes. i thought it was important to collect this history because industrial city in the latter part of the 19th century and early part! it's kind of 9wzeq57uncommon in west virginia in that it drew a lot of immigrants here in searchri ÷ ofcv.iñ jobs and opportunity.oa that generationfd y is pretty much

gone. most people tend to focus on the frontier history. those periods are 8qh$q9q but of equal importance invíbw my mind is this industrial period and (the immigration that wheeling had. >> wheeling starts as an outpost on the frontier. that river was the western extent of the united states injp the 1770s.6m the first project was the national road thatlí@ñ

growth.9y;p÷& over the next 20 to 25 years the population of wheeling will almost triple. >> watch saturdaya'at noon eastern on c-span2 book(ks%ñ tv and sunday afternoon onpe&s american shift tv on c-span3. wisconsin congressmanéóuñpaul house ways and means committee. atz$f hi first committee meeting as chair members heard from three economists about the statew0 of the u.s. economy. it includes discussions about how the economy will affect tax reform, healthll financial regulations. this is $@ om 7nyx=ñ3n;[t hours."ó hg >> the committeevb>will come to order.

start off r absolute privilege and honor it is toñzia chair this committee. i've served9qg:ñ with my of you on this committee2rñ for quite a while, 14>ido@zs years for myself.29 i came into this congress with a number of you. i see mr.gz#ó larson there. i think joe is coming. i came with kevin. it's been a pleasure serving on this committee. i want to tell you how i feel tremendouslyd:íf gratified and second of all announcement. we're not in the ways and means room be ways and means room is being rewired for sound reasons because it's also the alternative floor location. that rewiring and reworking the room0s completed byía hopefully if all goes o8vwell

we'll stop having meetings and it in the ways and means hearing room int i've also seen this committeepbhx run very well and sometimes not so well. ó8onuñ this committee deals with some of the toughest issues our countryñ faces. i 7+[>"_t(q this committee so we have a full debate on the issues a full respectful debate on the issues. i also want to$b ensure t(bq we treat each other with respectlu andlkkb that we conduct our debates in a civil manner. i'm going to work very>r? closely with the46q ranking member mr. levin toward that result. i'd like to welcome all ofí new membersqs returning members. to our returning members i'm glad to have this opportunity to serve with you in the ulicongress. to our n !çj members i would like to introduce you by name. we have pat from pennsylvania. christy nome from south dakota.

george holding from+)p north carolina and jason smithtfh missouri. welcome to our new members. last week we noted theññgparing titled moving'8=:tá today we will hear from three experts about the economy. as avqfñí?;l technical matter and for the time being we are not going to be calling this?s a hearing. as we discussed with the minority staff the house is not yetg standing[ñ% committees. committees cannot organize until membersíz are officially elect by we expect this=dú election to hapé"ku this afternoon. holding an informal briefing hearing. however, weãwill runó7yfoó:ug the briefing under the rule of past congresss. the gibb bonns rule is unique to ways andó gúú means committee. it provides that members present

in the room at the time of the #-d6$f1 o gaveling in will be recognized by seniority. members who arrive after the gavel will be recognized in order in which

i want to thank you for7--ñ sharing your time and we look forward to hearing your testimony. we wanted9fu6 to hold this hearing mission this year is to move america forward. this committee is going command central.= we're going the lead the charge in some of the biggest issuesô+ facing our economy; tax reform trade agreements health care. our thinking is let's get a lay of the gc6 land. before we can set things right with the economy, we've got to understand what's beginning wrong with the economy. how are we doing? well, weg n; jobs are up but thiskx3< bit of good news looks gootd only because the rest of the news has been so bad.pó.?zz÷n@" for so long. there's no getting around the on! fact thisn:w0ówqmq is the worth economic recovery since the great depression. of the average post-war economy it would be about $5,700 more

per person.c3;< paychecks haven't budged. more people have given upn1:÷ looking for ñ work. in fact, there's never been more people out of the2 ky than there are5kñúñ today. overcó 92 million people. as one person told nbc news if you want to make $9 an hour you can get a u if you want to make a wage to support your family, good luck. in other words, this is the nicest car in the junk yard. this administration's policies field.r3y !kup we need to take people off the#)çwx sidelines and get them5 the economy, working learning, building creating. we'll expand opportunity for all americans. that's the second reason fob&m?( this hearing. we want to start laying outvh6q solutions. this committee has done ag çju of work on that front. this year we're going to build

on those gains. the fact is we know what it will take to turn thin?[c0ñ around. we just need to put those?d1d ideas to work. for instance, it's very clear that our tax code is broken. we have the highest corporate tax rateha incdddc the industrialized world. we're one of the few]; that taxesn&s bring their money back home. americans spend over six billion hours a year just filling out their tax returns. there's no good reason for any of this. we need to make the tax code simpler, fairer and flatter so more people can invest and create jobs righta t here in rher america. we also have a good opportunity to expand markets for#lúztvjzr exports. trade promotion authority would empower congress and hold the administration accountable. tpa would help us get the best deal from our tradingh2

as we all know, 96%yt= of the world'st2[ñ consumers 96% of the world consumers don't live here. they live in overther countries. u.s. manufacturers have more than a $50 billion surplus with trade agreement countries. in in-+x rest of therw world was more than $500 billion. i believe americans can compete with any country. we just need to give them chance. break down these barriers in american trade along with american jobs will take you have. we also need to repeal and replace obama care with patient center reforms. it may take a newd&resident toyáx fully repeal thu?:

piece by piece. give power back gç to patients. that's how to make health care more affordable. we have to get spending under control. we have to get spending under longer live under the threat of a debìh& crisis. finally, we got to get people out of poverty. we've got to restore upper mobility. we've got to restore the promise and notion of the american idea that the condition of your birthday doesn't determine the outcome of your life in this country. that'sífsí@ñ we're all taught. not enough are living i/?- today. we need to get people fromen(s welfare to work. there's a lot of untapped this committee has real opportunity to helpp.r= working families get ahead. going to be about moving america forward. i've laid out a few ideas to get theqkjg conversationv0ql started. some will agree with one another, some we may not. i look forward to hearing from our members and our witnesses.

different ideas, andv[ hear them. i think we can all agree thatjíñ building a healthy economy that's our mission this year. that's our focus and goal because that's what the american people deserve. with that i'djni5b áur+rq&d to the distinguished ranking member from michigan mr. levin. >> thank you very much. congratulations on your 6 that wasn't our first wish. let me also say that as i express to you"9 the packers you'd be clean shaven today. >> you would have a beard. i want everybody to know why paul ryan is if the quarterbacks health doesn't resume i think you'll

be clean shaven at the next hearing. >> we shall see. >> any way, good luck tomi8m the packers. let me just lay outj,+j a few views for us democrats as democrats as we proceed. our economy has9x t experienced a major bounce back. it is rebounded from the loss of 7 million jobs. in a single year, beginning in 2008,v)a and an unemployment rate thatd@ soared to 10% 2 é 2009. more than 11 million private sector jobs have been created in the last fiver-téñ years.1!#:ñ"bxñ as shown in the chart that i hope will now appear here. with÷b1c 58 straight months of$jbi÷ private sector job growth leading the

to fall to 5.6%. so i thinku3ob referenced to a junkyard is terribes i know somethingir:5j'5ú about 5;kñcars. i think the

insurance. millions now have it who neverls&ñ had ) and health care355) premiums arej&hm growing at÷÷ years. this major= u reversal from deep decline,éçs á of the job yard to economic growth occurred despite republican opposition to the president's proposals, repeated gop threats tóç? onvg /yxt-ñ debt obligations and an incredibly harmful 16t:3 day governmental shut downql#2pm an .cénñunending ideological opposition to the aca. this year must see a different environment. it must mr. chairman and colleagues, see bipartisan action on important issues. among thelo% deepest challenges facing our economy today remain

one that has persisted nor deck eded for r;[apq(p"es, starting in the 1980 as stagnant middle class wage growth and now this second charting, aoxt> striking one from epi,!cs shows2 (ç the nearly flat&á line of wage growth that the bottom 90% of american workers has .f experienced sinceújqñ 1980 even as.h)tñ incomes have grown significantly, indeed, dramatically, among the very wealthiest. this chartuúa&ñ is really dramatic, 90% has mo stagnant income while for the very wealthy, it has spiralled.7 ecn&÷ indeed in é kronchronicle+(vñbaúx chronicled, the long-standing(/ouu problems facing america'so úbq

middle class. they found that the average wage in a quarter in american counti @!d jj today than it was 35 years ! ago. lives of america'siw middle class. and yet even immediate and much needed steps the democrats have0q promoted to address this problem havemñi1ñ encountered an ideological roadblock from republicans efforts to increase the minimum wage and to insure that women earn the same as men for equal work, those have fierce republican resistance. 3cm6k¢%9%mqiq%=9 proposal to require overtime pay for millions of additional white collar workers who are currently not covered has been6u