for 300 years. this is a pretty big deal actually for my country, and a lot of us are concerned about what the invocations might be. i government has my government has facilitated holding a referendum as a result of the election of a scottish nationalist majority in the local elections last time around in scotland in 2011 but the british government is not actually neutral. they are the principal opposition parties, taking the view that we would like the united kingdom to stay together and that is why you will hear scottish and also english and welsh and other business leaders in the u.k. expressing an opinion as to whether they do our do not want scotland to become independent. if there is a majority in favor of independence in september, then that is what will happen, and we will all have to scurry

around to make a lot of changes to a lot of things in the ways in which the united kingdom conducts its business. one of the many questions that arises, and there are lots about currency, foreign investment, defense, nato commitments, and all sorts of things that are out rights, aut pension share of the sovereign debt of ,he on and -- united kingdom mr. salmon, who is the first minister of scotland, said he expects there to be a seamless transition. that is not what leaders of the european union has said. others have said that if scotland leaves the united kingdom and wants to join the european union, it will have to take its place in the queue and apply like every other candidate country and would require unanimous consent of everyone of the 28 members of the eu. i would be surprised if all that got done seamlessly in 18 months, but we will see.

it is clear that there are some -- with bits applying for membership in the european union. it is one of a number quite complex questions that would arise in the event there was a vote in favor of independence in september. >> let me just add a few words and then we will close. i think some of what we have the wayhas to do with you cooperate in the global economy and the global world. cooperation between nation is of course still the main way of working, and it still is a source of a lot of democratic legitimacy because of the feeling of belonging, of identity, of the democratic mechanism within the

nationstate. and i do believe and i think we had examples of that today, and we will have other examples, require aissues do degree of cooperation between nationstates and global citizenship or regional citizenship, in africa, for example. africa could do much better if there was more integration in africa. so there is that issue, and i think we are struggling with it. in my own experience, let me just share one thing. how a person gets a particular , and of course the commission is a much more political organization, as jack said, and the imf or the world bank. but to some degree, there try to solve

economic problems and manage global economic corporations and so on. there has to be a certain amount of legitimacy in these bureaucracies, which very often has to be kind of personalized. in politics and in global civics and media, things get very personalized. she who is heading these organizations. so i think to view the appointments is purely it is the, whether commission are having the imf, the world bank, is no longer appropriate for today's world. , such ase been figures a technician who was not a political leader as head of the commission, but at the same time had a direct message to citizens and was accepted as such, and there are other examples one could give from other

international institutions. -- i don'tyears ago want to go into current examples , but despite the problems of the vietnam war, mcnamara was head of the world bank. he was addressing global citizenship, so to speak, and there had been leaders of the imf that had done similarly. so that element is important, and to somehow view global cooperation is purely a matter of national diplomacy's cooperating and working together , i think underestimates the degree of need there is for demos andregional away. tank you all for coming and particularly the wonderful panel we had. i hope you have enjoyed this and it is fulfilling its mission of

bringing such discussions .ogether p please give around of applause to our panel. [applause] [captions copyright national cable satellite corp. 2014] [captioning performed by national captioning institute] >> president obama is in poland at the start of a three country european trip. he announced this morning that the u.s. is getting ready to increase its military presence in europe at a cost of up to a billion dollars. he says the u.s. plans to send and military equipment traditional american troops into the region. he made the comments during a joint appearance with the polish president. tomorrow, president obama goes to brussels. while in poland, president obama was also asked about the swap of five taliban members for u.s.

bowe bergdahl. al usa today quotes president obama saying regardless of circumstances, we still get an american prisoner back. regarding allegations that he was a deserter, army secretary john mchugh said today the army will review this and a comprehensive accord and eight effort that will include speaking with sergeant bergdahl theetter learn from him circumstances of his disappearance in captivity. all other decisions will be made thereafter and in accordance with appropriate regulations, policies, and practices. tomorrow marks the 25th anniversary of the tnm and square back down. tonight at 10:00 eastern, we will show you some of the reaction from u.s. government in the days following the 1989

events. you will see president george h.w. bush's news conference and house and senate debate over the u.s. response. this morning, washington journal talk to a member of congress who participated in that debate. here is a look. >> what happened 25 years ago? there was a tremendous move, there were students and others anded who -- who joined in, it was probably one of the greatest hopes and expectations i have ever had. after two months, a relatively theeful demonstrations, dictatorship decided to come down with an iron fist. they sent in and a large number of they net wielding soldiers where they hunted down to, took many to prison, where they were tortured.

the labor camps, which many of them ended up in. it was one of the worst, right in plain view of time magazine. cnn was covering it live. unfortunately, the response from the west was very weak. and enabling. perhaps unwittingly, but it was. very little outrage. there was a big move for democracy. we saw it in the union and the east block, but not so for the beleaguered activists who have sacrificed so much. i just had a hearing. you covered it friday with of the activist who were there, all of whom spent some time in detention or in prison, who told the story of make -- missed opportunities, especially

including june 4, when there was such a lackluster response from interested parties around the world. host: there have been varied accounts and we have been looking for -- at some of the pictures. what was the final death toll? guest: it is still open for discussion. the government never allowed and in the end and investigation. -- independent investigation. on times, the numbers are in the thousands. at least 200 were killed right on this where as all of this was happening. the interesting thing is, a few years later, president clinton invited the operational commander who ordered the slaughter of the students, had him into the white house, gave him a 19 gun salute, i think he should've been held liable for crimes against humanity. he went to the army war college and said in answer to a western

in 1996 thomas nobody died at this where. i put together a hearing and had many of those who were there who said, we watched as people were killed by tanks, bayoneted, shot and beaten by the time to death. all of the press back in china, how he went to the white house and was treated like an honored guest. i thought it was a horrible show of lack of concern with the man who said to go in there and kill those students. host: you talked about reaction. let's go back to june 6, 1989. george h.w. bush had this to say at the white house.

>> a single student standing in front of the tank, and then, i might add, seeing the anchor driver exercise restraint. i am convinced the forces of democracy will overcome these events in the square. on the commercial side, i do not want to hurt the chinese people. i believe commercial contracts have led, in essence them to the west or more freedom. i think people have commercial incentive, whether in china or other totalitarian systems, the move to democracy becomes more inexorable. host: president george h.w. bush. was that strong or tepid? guest: i think tepid. i think he made a fundamental miscalculation, however good willed he was, to talk about

hurting the chinese evil, our trade deficit and trading relationship with china at that time was miniscule. many of us were arguing in the 1980's and 1990's we need to link it can progress in human rights with a most favored trading status of the chinese products get well treated when they are imported here but only , if human rights are followed. it had to be achieved, significant progress. bill clinton actually called president bush's response -- he called it coddling dictatorship. even though i am a republican, i agree with him. then bill clinton did one of the most shameless things in history. we had the votes to take away most favored nation status. totally bipartisan. in 1993, the president said to just if him a year.

-- give them a year. he wrote out any that you order that talked about significant progress in all categories of human rights observance. it was a beautiful order. true solidarity. six months in, no matter what they do in china, they were going to get the trading privileges and human rights will be shredded in the nearest waste bin. i met with foreign minister people. hundreds said we stand with clinton and we mean it. if you do not improve, you will lose the trading privilege. i was laughed at in beijing. a big smile came on the face of one of my interlocutors. sure enough, on may 26, 1994, and c-span covered the press conference i had, on a friday, when no one was left in congress were very few were still around, late in the day, a new cycle was

over. though clinton took his exit of order and ripped it in half. even though there was no progress, there was sickness and deterioration. -- significant deterioration. no human rights conditionality what so ever. that is when we lost china. we put profits above people and above torture, religious persecution, and all the other human rights abuses. president bush was wrong. they have not matriculated to democracy or respect for human rights. clinton got it right. then buckles, may 26, 1994, we lost china. host: part of the diplomatic equation is the debt we had with china. >> but not the end, now there is

that talk, but not then. >> my question is how that has impacted this debate. guest: hillary clinton made her first trip in china. she said, i will not let human rights interfere with global climate change issues. many activists, all of the great activist who have spent decades of their lives in prison suffering torture. harry role was in my office a day or two after she made that statement. he got angry, his hands were shaking. he's said, clinton does not care about human rights. it is through the dissonance. human rights always at the center piece of our relationship with a country am a and human rights and christians ain't persecuted, always at the center

of that relationship and not so with china. -- christians who were being persecuted. that again was another iteration of 1994 capitulation with her husband, bill clinton. these are all unnecessary. there have been missed opportunities get i asked the question friday. all of the witnesses recounted these opportunities staring us right in the face to have the facts of the best and brightest in china whose effort human rights. the changs and these other great men and women, who just want democracy and freedom and they deserve it. our universally recognized values. host: let me get your reaction to these headlines. --

guest: i have been working on the internet or balance and answer ship issue as well. i had a hearing several years back in which we had google, yahoo!, all test the five. -- all testify. i swore all of the individuals in. shamelessly, we have been part and parcel of the censorship -- yahoo!, for example, gave up to a of e-mail accounts journalist who got 10 years in prison for telling an engineer in new york city what they could and could not do around the observance of tiananmen square. we cannot have corporate complicity either. google and some of the other internet providers now support a bill i have introduced, called the global online freedom act, which would require a full

disclosure of what is being censored. i went to the café in beijing some years back and have my own name block. i put in the word "torture" and i got guantanamo and what the japanese did , and it was terrific, during world war ii in china. in manfred, a special representative at the time for the united nations. i got a guantánamo report he had done, but not the scathing report on the identities of torture against chinese .issidents you can gett, which on regular google, but you could not get it in china. censorship has enabled the dictatorship to stay.

-- andg secret police they have it. it has gotten worse, not better, over the years. it is ubiquitous, it is everywhere. if you ask a student today about ,iananmen square in beijing they have no clue about what 4, 1989.on june >> our conversation is congressman christopher smith, first elected back in 1980. he represents new jersey's fourth congressional district and serves on the house foreign affairs committee and is chair of the foreign affairs subcommittee focused on global human rights. congressman, thank you very much for being with us. >> we will have more marking the 25th anniversary of the tiananmen square crackdown tonight at 10:00 eastern. you will george h.w. bush's news conference in house and senate the bait over the u.s. response. it begins at 10:00 eastern, here on c-span. undersecretary

intelligence michael vickers today discussed intelligence challenges around russia, syria, al qaeda, and cyber threats. moderated a discussion following mr. vickers remarks. the center for strategic and international studies of the hour-long event. >> it is a glorious morning, absolutely fabulous. we deserve it for the winter we had. to the to all of you and military strategy for them. my special thanks to our friends at rolls-royce who make it possible for us to make this series available to the policy community in washington. we are very delighted to have mike vickers with us this morning. i was serving in the armed -- i cannotmittee remember the year.

wehink it was 19 88 when created the whole program and the special operations command, and i think that we actually had mike in mind for who would be the leader. it took a while for us to find him. assistant be the secretary back in 2007. the bush administration asked him to come in and give some direction. he did a masterful job. of course been gates felt that no one would be better to replace jim clapper then mike to be the undersecretary for intelligence. it has been masterful service, mike.

we have been lucky as a country to have you at this crucial time. i know it has been challenging as an assignment, but you shouldered it so wonderfully and the whole community is grateful for what you have done. regard to have a very interesting session this morning. i expect this is going to be a very vivid and lively session. would you with your applause please welcome mike vickers, undersecretary for intelligence. [applause] >> thank you for that really gracious introduction, and thank you to dr. hit for your distinguished service to our country and to csi as for putting on important forums such as this. i thought i would make a few remarks this morning for about 20 minutes and then take questions as the standard

format. next slide, please. >> all right. which one? i'm qualified now on this thing. so i'm going to talk about these four topics, and given that this is a military strategy for him, i'm going to try to move beyond my intelligence brief a little bit and talk about some of the implications for strategy, foreign actual security

strategy, defense strategy, and intelligent strategy as we look at these issues. one of the things i would like to leave you with is the tremendous change that's taken place in our intelligence capabilities over the past decade, and the even greater change that we foresee looking forward. is of the aspects of this the revolutionary impact precision targeting has had across our intelligence enterprise, whether it's in counterterrorism operations, whether it's in cyber operations, or classic human intelligence and espionage. to illustrate this, if you'll will indulge me, i would like to tell a joke that my former boss, secretary bob gates, used to love to tell. , supposedly, an intelligence officer was working in a foreign capital at a

diplomatic cocktail party, trolling the diplomatic circuit as we always do, looking for hard targets. unfortunately, this officer had a little bit too much to drink, so his mission attention wandered a little bit toward more amorous pursuits rather than the traditional hard targets. across the room at this big reception, he spotted what he saw was a vision of loveliness in a flowing red gown. so using all his appropriate tradecraft, he approached the target and made a pitch, asking the target if he could have a , the, and to his shock target immediately rebuffed him and said i am rebuffing you for three reasons. first, you are dropped. second, this is not a waltz, it is the peruvian national anthem, and third, i'm not a woman, i am the cardinal archbishop of lima. so we are little better than

that today. next slide, lease. to go through a range of national security challenges, the continued terrorism threat posed by al qaeda and its affiliates being the first one. the key point i want to leave you with here, why we have had a lot of success in severely core ing the al qaeda the pakistan-afghanistan border region, they continue to pose a threat, particularly a reconstitution threat down the road. the three biggest threats are really al qaeda in the arabian peninsula, in yemen, and the growing al qaeda threat in syria. threats are spread elsewhere in their taking advantage of what we call the metastasize nation across the middle east and north africa.

that is conditions created by overrunning government spaces in the historic transformation that is underway in that region. there is also of course the threat of a homegrown violent extremist, as we saw with the boston bomber and others as well . this really remains job one for the intelligence community and our special operations forces as well. presents acivil war particularly vexing national security challenge. it's a horrific civil war with 150,000 dead. ofis a humanitarian crisis mind-boggling proportions, with some 9 million internally displaced or refugees who have fled the country. about two thirds and one third,

and a continuing humanitarian crisis. and of course it's giving rise to the significant terrorism threat there as well. as the president noted in his speech at west point, we are committed to supporting the syrian opposition, to help them in their stand against the brutal dictator, bashar al-assad, and to help them fight for the right of all syrian people to determine their own future, and then finally, to deny terrorists sanctuary or safe haven that they are currently enjoying in syria. we will work with the congress to ramp up our support for the opposition. -- it hasn

many aspects but most concerning is the destabilization going on in eastern ukraine and what is termed unconventional warfare. russian forces have pulled back their troops from the border region. they have not ceased their support for pro-russian ukraine,ts in eastern and that threat remains to the government of ukraine and its territorial integrity. -- these threats span the range from intellectual property theft disrupted denial of service attack to destructive attack through malware. an emerging domain that has moved very rapidly over the past couple of years, we have had destructive attacks against south korea, against saudi

denial of service attacks against the u.s. financial sector, as director clapper made clear in his unclassified annual threat assessment. likelihood of future destructive attacks is increasing. there we go, my first test. wmd'seration and used of is the next issue for us. continue to have concerns about the iranian and north korean nuclear missile programs. iran has made considerable progress in its ability to uranium andtockpile has continued to work on its missile programs. north korea, as director clapper indicated in his annual threat assessment, we assess is expanding its facility for

uranium enrichment and has restarted its graphite moderated reactor and continues to develop long-range missile programs, most notably the 08 that itnental kn has displayed publicly a few times. i already allete it to this earlier about the persistent volatility across middle east, north africa, and south asia, that will likely be with us for a long time to come and will give rise to a range of national security challenges. this is one of the key enduring challenges i think we face along with a couple of others on this slide and the previous one. transition in afghanistan, the president announced right before his speech at west point that we will maintain 9800 troops in afghanistan. by the end of calendar 2015, we

will reduce that posture approximately in half and consolidate the force on kabul bagram.k ru afghan forces assumed the lead for combat operations last year combatinto sheer, operations in afghanistan will cease. we will continue to train, advise, and assist afghan forces and to pursue our continued counterterrorism mission in the region. china -- china of late has engaged in provocative behavior and maritime disputes across the east asian littoral.

it is continuing its military and has attempted engagement in. asia by asserting that the united states is a declining power, which we are most certainly not. the key thing i would like you to take away from the previous two slides is that when you look of aese in total, a number senior intelligence officers, and others,pper, have not seen this range of challenges on and administration's plate in our careers. we may be wrong about that, but that's our collective judgment. the second point is that, taken

together, these are highly asymmetric challenges. they are not directly head-on head. are even further, unconventional or novel, as in the cyber case, or indirect in terms of challenges happening across the region or the relationship between economic our and national security power. the other point i want to highlight is that unlike the cold war, where we had one , and not to be discounted, national security challenge, and in a series of crises. a number of these are likely to be more persistent and enduring. so that creates challenges for strategy as you deal with solveng very difficult to multiple problems. some of you may remember in the late 1970's in the department of defense, we developed in

response to the situation in central europe and offset strategy to counter soviet military power and then follow that up through the 1980's with a series of other strategies to reinforce that and bring an end to the cold war. today, we need not just one offset strategy but a series of them to deal with these specific challenges. the final point i want to make is that also critical to dealing of enduringet challenges is the continued economic and technological leadership of the united states, which as former secretary gates and others have said is a national security imperative for us. to talk a little bit about the relationship between intelligence and national security. we always say it is the first line of defense. this time going forward, we really do mean it.

us,benefits that it gives it informs our national security policy. if you're the president and his top advisers were trying to make sense of this wide array of challenges, intelligence is the first thing you need to have to understand a world in which you are dealing with. for our operators, war fighters and other operators, our intelligence capabilities really enable what we call precisionce driven, operations. when directed by the president, the intelligence community provides him with additional options in between diplomacy and the over use of military force. these are very important as well. principalurse our reason is preventing surprise. i would add other -- one other point as we look at this. is ais, intelligence

significant source of advantage for the united states today. it's an advantage that is very important to us, but also one that has to be used aggressively, but also prudently, to make sure we are helping our leaders solve problems and not adding to their problems. of course as you conduct operations, there is inherent risk in them, so the risk gain is something we look at all the time and continue to evolve. now i'd like to talk about some investments we are making incapability areas to sustain this intelligence advantage well into the future. i've grouped into five areas to focus defense intelligence and our integration with national intelligence on the defense strategic guidance that dr. hicks worked on so ably a couple

of years ago, i guess it was. the president signed out, and in our quadrennial defense review which we just completed and soon to be released national intelligence strategy. i grouped our major priorities into five areas. global coverage, the ability to -- sustaining our capabilities in counterterrorism operations and adding to them and counter proliferation, building out our cyber capabilities, and strengthening our capabilities in counterintelligence and security. let me touch on a few of these. first, global coverage. this really enables everything we do across mission areas. as budgets flat or decline, it becomes even more important, given the global distribution and diversity of challenges that we face.

i can't say too much about the specifics in many of these areas, but i will say a few things. the first, as director clapper said in colorado springs a couple of weeks ago, and the director of the nro mentioned in a conference in florida about a month ago, there are big changes ourd in the way we use overhead space architecture. some of the biggest changes, in my view, that we have seen in several decades. it will be possible, as director clapper engine, through such ases activity-based intelligence and associated architecture capabilities to go with it to have persistence we have never had before. we can look at things for long periods of time on and you can imagine the benefits that will give us. the second aspect that i believe

will be revolutionary as we go forward, besides persistence, is integration. rather than having an overhead architecture, as betty sapp , as a set of individual systems with supporting systems, we will have for the first time going forward a really integrated architecture and there are tremendous benefits that come from that. we are working to strengthen our crypto analytic capabilities and our national level of defense human capabilities. that is called the defense clandestine service. with ourssociated rebalance to asia and to keep challenges,gh-end we are working on assured

persistence, intelligence surveillance and reconnaissance, of our spaceiency architecture. that's about all i can say at that point. but the third bullet is really indicative there, and that is we are focused as a strategy on adapting some of the techniques we have learned in counterterrorism where we had gotten incredibly precise and apply that to these higher into environments. area, counterterrorism the predator and reaper, the aircraft on affectionately known as drones, have been the signature weapon of our counterterrorism capability over the past decade. but just the improvised explosive device has been the signature weapon of insurgents and terrorists. it has enabled the most precise campaign, counterterrorism

campaign in the history of warfare, and it is our most effective instrument. we are very healthy in this area, but we are looking to make in some advanced sensors as well as extending the range of our second generation platform considerably. integration between our operators and intelligence is another key advantage in both of these areas and something we are working to sustain as well. then back to the challenges chart. evolves andoblem shifts on us, we are at a turning point, not just in national security strategy, but also in the counterterrorism arena, the need to rebalance and rethink some of the ways we have done business. what has really worked, what is adaptable to the evolving threat, what is not, what do we

need to invent a new? on cyber capabilities, we are making significant progress in developing a cyber force to defend our networks, to support combatant commanders, and to defend the united states if called upon to do so, and the associated support structures to go with it, intelligence capabilities, as you would in any domain whether to space or cyber or others. key to making it cyber force effective on and we have had a number of great sessions here, is really our partnerships across the u.s. government, the department of homeland security and the fbi, but also with andstry, in terms of particularly in the area of information sharing. finally, counterintelligence and security. as a result of wiki leak,

snowden, for good and the navy yard review -- navy yard attack in the reviews associated with those four incidents, we have taken significant measures to strengthen our capabilities against insider threats, whether it's workplace violence or and are establishing an insider threat center going forward. we are also working with congress and opm and the dni, looking to shift the way we evaluate people for positions of responsibility and security clearances through a method call continuous evaluation. if you think of snapshots in time where you do an investigation and then you wait several years and do it again, this is more a continuous dream like you do with credit checks. we believe it will have a number of advantages.

let me conclude by talking about the importance of intelligence integration. this was the focus of the 9/11 commission and there are four areas i would like to talk about. honestly predated 9/11 and has been at work, has been the process of a couple of decades of work, and others have really accelerated since then in responding to evolving threats. the first one is integration within agencies. the cia in the 1980's is not the cia of today. it is vastly improved in terms of its major components and it produces big dividends by doing so. workntelligence agencies much closer together. it's hard to find a case where a single intelligence agency has been responsible for a significant intelligence breakthrough or operation. the enlightened case is a

particular -- the bin laden case is a particular example of that. that really is the model going forward. director clapper and i have made it a top priority to make sure that our national defense intelligence programs are integrated and transparent to each other. we make another -- a number of joint investments together. we depend on each other's capabilities to our missions, things you would think of as tactical capabilities to perform some critically important national mission, and our tactical operations in the department depend critically on national capabilities. then finally the partnership between the department of defense and the central intelligence agency is very important across the board in a ander of intelligence areas in capabilities. so with that, i would like to can loot, and i would be happy to take your questions.

[applause] >> thank you very much, secretary vickers, for your great remarks, and good morning to everyone. i'm kathleen hit. .- kathleen hicks you cover the waterfront, and it gives us a very rich conversation opportunity here with the audience. i will turn it over to them for questions in a few minutes. there are a few things i thought i would start with. , onelast issue you raised generally on integration dod-ciaally on the case. in the time that you have been in your position in the department of defense, from 2007 to now, we have come from the world of trying to transition from need to know to need to culture of hope a

need to share. that was the intent. now we have had a series of incidents that test that. snowden being the most recent. i'm wondering if you can give a sense of where you think the community is and where the community needs to be on this issue of how much to share, how to control information. have we swung too far, or in fact do we just need to accept there are risks that come from a need to share overture -- culture? we continue to have a strong need to share intelligence. our national security strategy .epends on enabling partners that requires intelligence make theand to national security apparatus

ineffective across the interagency, both the mystic and foreign, also requires a high degree of intelligence sharing, while also protecting need to know. , we areat vein modernizing our information technologies to try -- or information technology systems, excuse me, across the department of defense and the ic to try to strike a reasonable balance between the need to protect information and also distributed. called icite, intelligence community intelligence technology in her prize. and in the department, we are moving toward a system call for joint information environment. both of those are cloud-based and will give us some security advantages along with other technologies.

in a way it's really the right balance to be struck, that there like bin laden, had to be compartmented intensely. others less so, but we can't from theve back information sharing environment. we just have to do it more responsibly. dod-cianded on the nexus and that's an area where you have been particularly effective at bringing in the two agencies together. the president last week reiterated his call to , moretion more operations emphasis from cia to dod on the counterterrorism direct action piece. i'm wondering if you can speak a little bit about how that transition is going that he had talked about previously, and what the challenges are facing the department of defense as it

takes on these missions that in some cases have been done by the cia. into much want to go detail here. let me make a couple of points. one, our assistant to the president for homeland security and counterterrorism will be making a speech in the very near update on what has progressed since the president's beach at the national defense university last may. so i don't want to steal her thunder, and i will leave that to her. , wealso, suffice it to say have been working since last may and actually before, to implement the president's guidance. dod does precision counterterrorism operations, and make sure we have an integrated counterterrorism capability of cross our ic and the department

to meet the president's needs. , ind let me stick with isr general. you have made a compelling case for why intelligence is so important in an environment that is diffuse and unpredictable in its threats. we can talk about ukraine and others. pressure is incredibly intense and you alluded to the flat budget. the budget environment is not conducive to a great deal of increased investment in many areas. sow well do you think isr fare in that budget environment, and are there areas of particular concern that you have in terms of how we make sure the entire intelligence in her prize is well resourced? >> sure -- the entire

intelligence enterprise is well resourced? focus ourf key intelligence surveillance reconnaissance, ciber, and special operations forces. we have the priority we believe it requires. know, we haveyou to be very focused on our investments and what we prioritize. isr or other capability areas , undersea warfare, long-range strike bomber, we are focusing on a critical set of investments that are very important to our asia rebalance. thee have been protected in department, as well as the continuing capabilities we will need for the counterterrorism problem and the instability ,cross the greater middle east and in the cyber challenges.

grouped the have capability areas that we have. one of the challenges we face across the department, i would now more than ever, we have to have an intelligent sport olio approach to investment. with theecall different national security challenges we faced in the 1990's, one would think about her joint force that had capabilities that could stretch either right or left as necessary. thanks to your leadership, we have long since abandoned that in the department. so we carefully adopt across this beckerman challenges we have had a series of targeted outsidents, more of an in approach, high-end and low-end, and see what meets in the middle. tot seems to be the best way

meet our national security challenges right now. with flat and declining budgets, it remains a challenge. >> are there areas on the intelligence side that are particularly worrisome to you? i will give you complete hypothetical. growing the required human in the right language skills sets with the right focus, given the diffusion of the threat. are there areas you can point to that are something we should be thinking about is a country as we move further into the 21st century on the intelligence side? click sure, for some of these investments -- >> sure, some of itse investments depend on or technological advances are making sure significant resources are provided for some andur global coverage access denial capabilities. for others such as strengthening

our human capabilities, it's more about human capital. it's not a big budget issue as it is a language, training, posture integration, a number of things that take time to moreform a force, but it's on the softer side of business, but no less hard because you are changing institutions from one to another. , a very in cyber evolving field, in developing the capabilities, but they depend on other capabilities as well. then also they depend on public-private harder ships. in each case, there is a critical dependency that is in these capability areas, so those are the challenges i try to wrestle to the ground with director clapper. ask one more question and then turn it over to the audience.

have folks who are ready to test your knowledge base. let me ask you a really obvious question about ukraine. how well prepared do you think the intelligence community was to see russian intent in terms of the annexation of crimea in particular, and are we now focusing energy on russia as a result of that action and subsequent activity by russia? >> i guess i would answer that russia is a complex intelligence challenge, something we have been working since the end of the cold war in the intervening but it has been -- there havely been spikes because of build up

to crises are actual crises. for example, the invasion of georgia in 2008, and then most recently ukraine. crimea was done very suddenly. as director clapper and others have said, the intelligence community did a pretty good job warning tog overall the magnitude of the problem, but there are things we could always do better in certain areas. at, oncery good confronted with the crisis, in terms of responding to it, and we are getting better and better. we have continued to improve as the crisis has shifted to what i described as unconventional warfare in ukraine. and then the next part of the challenge which you alluded to

in your research question is really the longer-term challenge posed by this significant change in russian behavior and how we adapt the community to it. it is a work in progress, but it's definitely on leaders' radar screens. >> i see a question all the way over here. state your name and affiliation. i just returned from egypt as a monitor from democracy international. from a defense standpoint, how are you evolving policy for intelligence sharing with key international partners, especially those with challenging transitions on their hands? >> well, our intelligence-sharing is usually

done, almost always, on a bilateral basis. and it is tailored to the specific requirements of that partner. -- our individual agencies, depending on the case, may have relationships with counterparts in a given country, but we do this in an integrated fashion, approach, what we call the director of national intelligence representative. we do this in various forms by our national agencies through this one conduit to an international partner. case,at applies in egypt as well as others. asin egypt's case, as well

others. >> i am from georgia. you mentioned as one of the i kind of like this work, because it largely describes the mood in russia. is much wider than a geographical link to the ukraine. is, what is the scale -- your assessment -- what is the scale of the geography? where are the areas you anticipate are in crisis, mind two russian revanche is on-- linked to russian revanchism? >> that is why i had the broader challenge of revanchism on that slide, rather than the russia-ukraine crisis. i think of a number of challenges.

as we saw in ukraine most recently, on the border and in crimea -- there is a power it in the challenge, former soviet union. panoply of other influence means and unconventional threats that range from energy coercion to cyber to unconventional warfare, as we see. the --se threats made be the greater longer-term challenge, in a sense, because and are highly asymmetric,

they are not a traditional military power. that is how i see the longer-term challenge. >> the gentleman right here. .> thank you princeton university. i am a little puzzled by the administration attempt to essentially set a new rule in that of espionage, saying state led espionage on corporate entities, done to advantage other corporate entities of one's own country, is essentially unfair. few other countries recognize this rule. they would be extremely hard to enforce. i was wondering -- could do a

lay some of these concerns? tell us what the rationale is behind this attempt in the administration to set new rules? and whether you think it has a reasonable chance of being successful. thank you. the president was very clear in presidential policy directive 28, on our signals intelligence that the united states does not and will not engage in economic espionage, and to benefit american companies and international competition. as you noted, that practice is not universally followed by some other countries in the world. economicefer to my colleagues on this, but we think a global system that will produce economic prosperity for is -- would be most

conducive to having open ,nternational competition without states stealing private torets and handing them off their own national company. if you follow that logic, then additional costs that they would have to do to protect their systems, that i think are not economically productive. i am drawing on some of my economics training in grad school. i do not think that is what international companies should favor, and i think that is true across the board. it is not necessarily new, but definitive on our policy.

>> a two-part question on syria. about the options the pentagon administration is considering to assist arming the syrian rebels, and one other challenges it poses. the second part of the question is, at least four insurgents along the border between syria and iraq that seems to be disappearing, can you assess the threat and how there are kassman able to deal with the threat, giving this -- given the support the u.s. has provided so far? >> on the expanded assistance to the syrian opposition, i do not want to go further than the president did in his west point speech. we are developing options across the administration and consulting with congress on this .

that is about as far as i can go right now. on the threat posed by isis, as you call it, or as we call it is oil, the islamic state of iraq t, wee labonte -- lavan look at this as the regional problem, the remnant of al qaeda in iraq. most of the leadership went to syria after being significantly iraq, and they have ambitions to pose threats rotter in the region. it is a very malevolent , and one that we

are increasingly focused on. as you noted, they broke away from al qaeda recently. al qaeda was too nice for them. and then, as far as your question on iraq, through our office of security cooperation, we continue to provide , andtance to the iraqis across the instruments of the u.s. government, to meet the challenges in iraq. iraq is -- the conditions that give rise to the challenge their have a lot to do with the political challenge they have a significants terrorist threat. politicalre has to be

and economic solution as well as a counterterrorism solution to this problem. gains in made some containing its spread elsewhere, but it is a significant challenge to the government. >> you mentioned in the context of cyber, working with the industry as a partner, but industry works across other areas with the intelligence community as well. given all that has happened in the last three years, how is departments working with industry going to change, going forward, either in subtle or important ways? is an imperative. honest, the current environment and developments has not helped that partnership.

there is some legislation moving through the hill right now to try to cut the conditions that we support. into something as a country we are going to have to solve, because the threat is not going away. >> special operations consultant for socom. you probably remember at the oss dinner, john brennan got up and said there was not a better relationship in history than exists today. because of your background, and secretary gates and pineda -- there was testimony in front of the senate committee about, do we need to relook at thai till -- title 10 thosetle 50, and codify

under something like a title 56? fact that a so the number of us have worked together for a lot of years clearly helps. french politician said, graveyards are filled with indispensable men. we have put enough things in place that it will survive our current leadership. way to do business, and the challenges we face. need -- weink we evolved a lot since 2009. the beginning of the administration, title 10, title -- we are very,

very integrated, and go back and forth very easily. that part of the system is working really well. >> peter humphrey. i am an intel analyst. are you happy with the level of our dependence on foreign intelligence services, or maybe moving a fraction of our budget to get independent capabilities? or are we going the other way just to save money? >> we have plenty of independent capabilities. periodically in some, you can find you are too dependent on foreign leads on reporting. but i think we have learned from those experiences in the past.

we leverage -- we depend on partners, but have robust unilateral capabilities as well. one can always adjust the system. globally, i think, it serves us quite well. >> many computer experts feel that in an attack on a network, the advantage is with the attacker, and the defenders are really in the weaker position. attacks, fore of for espionage attacks on u.s. networks, that there be

some kind of response to the attacker other than trying to beef up the defenses, given the situation. if these experts are right, what is your advice to the administration, basically, when you have to tell them, we cannot really stop the attacks, because the attacker has the advantage. what is the policy? there is a code of conduct about proactive counterattacks, to dis-incentivize attacks. >> i try to keep my advice up the chain private, but let me try to answer your question. the cyber realm, it is a very dynamic field. growthecurity is a big

industry, and it involves quite a bit. there are a lot of what one would described as soft targets. to steale trying something among many things or attack something among many things, that is a hard defense. as i mentioned in regard to cyber policy, and economic strategy, it is not sound economics to have to invest in defenses. then, in terms of the , it stille response will be feasible and ultimately softer targets or harder targets. is a tool.

code of conduct -- is this in peoples interest, to carry out this kind of conflict? this is a new and evolving domain. some of the policy discussions are in their early stages, as well as potentially other methods. enforcement, blocking -- in cyber, you need to deploy the full range, and it is an evolving field. >> my question is, what is your solution about the cyber security issues between the u.s. and china? 26, involving tracking

of companies like microsoft and google. they do so much. the last parteat on google and microsoft? >> i am thinking of the hacking activities that involve companies like microsoft and google. thank you so much. >> i am not aware of a report about microsoft and google. question about cyber norms and cyber policy, we have a cyber working group to work with the chinese on establishing cyber code of conduct, which is an important initiative.

we certainly hope it will continue. >> you have been extremely generous with your time this morning. we put you through the ringer. i appreciate you being as forthcoming as you are able to be. obviously, you have a position that is difficult in terms of providing unclassified information. we appreciate your willingness to come down and talk to us. thank you. [applause] [captioning performed by national captioning institute] [captions copyright national cable satellite corp. 2014] >> if you missed any of that and nationaligence security, we will show it again tonight at 8:00 eastern on c-span two. harry reid and mitch mcconnell judiciaryre the

committee on campaign finance laws, and whether there should -- shouldtitutional be a constitutional action on those laws. senate republicans introduced legislation today to address the wait times at veterans medical centers. arizona senator john mccain also commented on president obama's decision to exchange five guantanamo bay prisoners for a u.s. soldier being held in the stem. here is a look. viewis agreement is, in my , puts future men and women who are serving in the military at great risk. judgedndividuals were as, in guantanamo, frequently, that if they were released it would cause a great risk to the

men and women who are serving on the battlefield. these individuals, as senator graham calls them, the fab five, --elieve, these individuals these individuals will be able qatar, and after one year, will be able to go back to afghanistan. 20% of those who have lost guantánamo have already gone back to the fight. these are wanted war criminals. one of them is supposedly guilty of murdering thousands of shiite while he was in charge outside of, i believe, kandahar. so this decision to bring home, and wedahl applaud that he is home, is ill

founded. it is a mistake. of it is putting the lives american servicemen and women at risk. that, to me, is unacceptable to the american people. word taliban -- >> they were members of al qaeda , too. >> they are listed as taliban leaders. listed as al qaeda leaders. >> they were associated with the taliban. in 2001, the taliban and al qaeda were working together. these individuals were working with al qaeda. .> they were held in guantánamo >> these people have dedicated their lives to destroying us. these people have dedicated their very existence. what do you think that if they released them, it would pose great risk to the united states of america?

they are taliban and al qaeda, don't you understand that? like you said, you are an old man. you might remember that in 2001 al qaeda found a haven with the taliban. that is why we initially invaded afghanistan. to separate these people is foolishness. understand your problem with giving up the five taliban members. that is very clear. aroundt get my hand homeuding bergdahl is while criticizing his release. >> i would continue to make every effort to bring him home. >> there has been some response to senator mccains remarks on our facebook page.

you can join the conversation at facebook.com/c-span. we will have all of senator mccain's press conference later onay at 7:35 p.m. eastern c-span, or any time at c-span.org. queen elizabeth will deliver a speech by the government that outlines the priorities for the coming year. members of the house of lords will join the house of commons to hear the queen's address. and on tomorrow's "washington journal," charles simpson of the heritage foundation looks at the

history of u.s. leaders who said they would not negotiate with terrorists. we look at campaign finance laws. livengton journal is wednesday on c-span. they look at the effect of climate change on agriculture. this is two hours.

>> i call this hearing of the green jobs subcommittee to order. historicdent made a announcement, moving forward a proposal to tackle coal-fired power plants. this action could not have come too soon. what we are seeing already are real impacts of climate change, impact being felt today, on the ground. longer a conversation about hypothetical events or computer models, what might or might not happen in the future. it is a conversation about the real costs to natural resources

in our rural communities and economy right now. the nationalgo, climate assessment came out with the most up-to-date review, focused on impacts we were already seeing across the united this report combines the expertise of dozens of the most preeminent scientists to conduct a comprehensive review to eliminate the climate impacts we are starting to see today, and the types of impacts we can expect to see in coming years. what was notable in that report is how much impact we are in farming,ng fishing, forestry, and hunting. these impacts are not always straightforward. climate change is one of many challenges facing the heirs, but is playing an important role in making existing challenges, such as drought and disease, even worse. the long-term trend toward

warmer and shorter winters is causing bark beetles to survive and making forests more susceptible to larger and more intense wildfires. for a state like oregon, where so much of our economy depends on a vibrant forest, this trend is troubling. warmer, shorter winters are also decreasing the amount of , leaving less water during the growing season. it is critical to irrigation since little rain falls in the summer months. oregon is seeing one of the worst droughts on record, after record droughts in 2001, 2010, and 2013. we can expect to see severe and intense droughts become more common. our streams are warmer and drier during the summer, which is impacting freshwater fishing.

less snowmelt and hotter summers are expected to contribute to a decline in salmon populations. our ocean fishermen have been dealing with the effects of climate change. on the oceans are causing fish to migrate. this causes the water to gradually become more acidic, which has had devastating impacts on northwest oyster farmers, whose baby oysters are acidicn those more waters. this is why we are holding the hearing today, to hear directly from those who work in those sectors, and whose livelihood depends on us taking action to prevent climate change getting worse. the witnesses we have invited to testify are people who have her stand experience working in the sectors. we also hear from to minority witnesses, who will present their viewpoints as climate change skeptics. i would like to extend a special gratitude to our colleague, who

is here to speed not only as a senator from a state who will be impacted by climate change, but as a farmer himself. overthat, i will turn this to senator wicker to give his opening remarks. >> thank you, mr. chairman, for holding this hearing. i will note it is our first hearing together as a subcommittee. i want to thank all of our witnesses for being here today. the panelesses and who will follow. as we discussed the impact on farming, fishing, and hunting, we must not neglect the effect that the economy and climate regulations what happened on these industries. epa administrator jane a mccarthy -- gina mccarthy announced new rules to regulate carbon emissions from existing power plants. effectould have little

on the climate, but the rules would have a negative effect on the livelihood of all energy users, including farmers, forrester's, and fishermen, who are the focus of today's hearing. farmers who irrigate their crops by pump would face higher utility bills. forester's would pay more timber, building materials, and paper, products essential to our economy. these economies already faced challenges in a difficult economic environment, but at what cost are we going to hurt these economic heirs in the pursuit of aggressive, dubious climate regulations? the costs are sure to go up. the benefits are not. the farmers are in the most likely to be affect it by altering weather patterns. in a peer-reviewed study that examined car producer

impressions of climate change, researchers found little belief among farmers that climate change will have a negative effect on crop yields. soybean yields in mississippi are at record high levels. farmers have been managing their crops effectively, and adapting to variable climate conditions for generations and generations. as is nothing new. unfortunately, this generation will now have to cope with higher electricity costs, it has a questionable climate regulations. for farmers who properly manage their land, a changing climate is not a problem, but burdensome regulations are. america's forests provide many benefits and services to society, including clean water and recreation, wildlife habitat, and forest products. need we be reminded that carbon dioxide is required for photosynthesis, the process by

grow plants tend to better? this has been dubbed co2 fertilization. a $15 billions industry and supports more than 63,000 full and part-time jobs. healthy, productive, and well-managed forests cover 60% of my home state. the industry employs 20% of mississippi's manufacturing workforce. given the current depressed market, higher prices for electricity would only worsen industry problems for forrester's who probably manage their trees. onerous regulations that increase the cost of forest reproduction is the problem. struck, mr. chairman, themy fellow senators, with increasing number of academics who are willing to come forward

and said yes on some of this conventional wisdom, they are skeptics. aasked to put into the record transcript of an interview yesterday afternoon on wtob with dr. peter morrissey, a university of maryland professor at the robert h smith business school. >> without objection. >> let me point out in the final minute -- professor morrissey said, a lot of this -- speaking of the new plan yesterday -- is going to needlessly raise costs. importantly, the amount of carbon dioxide we will up withina makes additional permissions in only 18 months. he goes on to point out, remember, co2 emissions is very different from smog. the environmentalists want to confuse that issue, saying you do not want smog and asthma and things like that. co2 emissions

is about the greenhouse effect and rising temperatures. asked about the thought that if the u.s. does not do something, countries like china and india definitely want, professor morrissey says, we are already doing something. and china is not joining us. he says, it is a fool's journey into the night to think that setting a good example will cause china to follow. the anchor says, we need to do something. professor morrissey says, we are doing something. the trick is to do something that matters, that has an effect. this asident is touting a solution, and it is not. he concludes, we are going to have to deal with the rising sea level, whether we do this or not. we have ann is, do economy that can bear what would be the truly large burden, much larger than this one?

we should be creating jobs and strengthening the economy, not hindering it. >> the conversation is not over. good discussions need to be held. we need to ask ourselves what the true facts are, and we will do so. and a growing number of scientists are demonstrating the falsity of many of the allegations that have been made as a result of warming temperatures and climate change. and we simply have to be honest about that. our economy is exceedingly fragile. it is very fragile. the average median income for working americans today is $2400 below what it was in 2007. we have fewer people working today than we had in 2007. unemployment remains high.

we cannot regulate and impose tots on american industry, the extent they cannot compete in the world market. and damage our economy. only a healthy economy and free the environment consistently improved. inealthy economies totalitarian countries have by far the worst environmental issues. mr. ash will testify. i am pleased in his written statement at least he did not compete the previous system -- theious statement before commission that we are having more flooding, droughts, and wildfires. that is not so. when i asked him about him, he submitted not one scientific report to justify that statement, when many scientific reports reject it.

president obama has twice changed that temperatures are rising faster than predicted. even over the last 10 years, he has said. and in fact, temperatures have flattened over the last 15 years, well below the average computer models for environmental expectations. all i am saying is, i don't know. maybe this is a temporary pause in some of the climate change that has been projected. maybe temperatures will rise again, but they are not rising with the experts predicted today. we have got more scientists like dr. smith that will puncture some of the irresponsible statements that are being made about forrester it. country, in the alabama. you understand the timber industry. one of the classic, big sawmills

-- i saw a large hall or in front of my house all the time. but all that land has been replanted. it is being managed exceedingly well. farmers and timber owners are managing better than ever. those trees, as you know, they suck harbor and out of the atmosphere. tree, once itg dies, it him its carbon back into the atmosphere. putting it in this building for a hundred years has reduced carbon in the atmosphere. boyd and forest are one of the very best ways we can reduce co2 in the atmosphere. it just is. i feel strongly about that. with regard to hunting and behind my house was a little creek. i calculated one time i spent a

year of my life in and around that creek, swimming in it, playing in it, fishing in it. a friend the creek, miles of basically forest. we saw very fresh to -- very few dear and very few -- we saw very few deer. now, they are everywhere. they are eating people's gardens. they are a pest. i guess because of after management. they are hunting better, managing their land better. we have a clear, without a inbt, increase in game alabama today, and i think to the rest of the country. we need to continue to make progress. i look forward to the hearing today.

involving the amendment of inples ability to speak out elections -- i am going to oppose that in a little bit. i appreciate this good hearing. >> senator imhoff? thathave to tell you , my wife isions upset because the deer are eating her begonias. nothe is not happy, i am happy, so i have a stake in this. i appreciate your coming. i have worked together with frank lucas on some of our small dam rehabilitation projects. l dam rehabilitation projects, and i look forward to hearing your testimony. although i've already read it, and won't be able to stay for it. that doesn't mean i don't love you anyway. all right. this is -- all we talk about

around here since he became chairman of this committee is trying to resurrect, trying to make people believe the world is coming to an end. this is the 31st, 31st hearing this committee's had, this committee i'm talking about the whole committee now, on global warming, since senator boxer came in as chairman, and with each one, the polling data has declined. i mean, it started off where it was number one or number two issue. the last gallup poll said it was number 14 out of 15. now i have to say that i know oklahoma's global warming regulations are no friend of farmers. it's interesting that this -- the title of this hearing is farming, fishing, forestry and hunting. well, farming, you come to oklahoma and talk to farmers and they'll tell you that this is a really a crisis that we're in the middle of right now considering all these regulations. in fact i'm going to quote tom buchanan president of the oklahoma farm bureau, he told me just yesterday this is his quote, they'll have a devastating effect if these regulations go into effect on

the farmers of rural oklahoma. it will be our number one concern and number one issue. that's the oklahoma farm bureau that is speaking. let me express my concern with the epa's just announced regulations for existing plants. and we understood on new plants that was a little bit different. that was very, very costly. but existing would even be more so. the figures that we have is that we require power plants around the country to reduce their greenhouse emissions by 30% to 2,000 five levels. now, we have done our own study for a long period of time going all the way back to right after kyoto was never submitted for ratification and found that the cost of that, and this comes from wharton school, m.i.t., comes from charles rivers associate is between $300 billion and $400 billion a year. that would be the largest tax increase in history. we know the chamber's come out with the amount of money it's going to cost in jobs and all of

that. now for decades the environmental left has pushed to enact, and again congress has rejected. now we've tried, we've had this before congress now, about 12 times, it has been rejected every single time. and each time by a larger margin. the first one was 2003. that was the mccain lieberman bill and then two years later it was rejected even by a larger -- a larger amount. so, it used to be the number one and now it's the number 14 concern, and it's a very large concern. so regardless the president is pushing this regulatory thing. we don't have to look any further than obama's model to come up with a conclusion. he talks about his green dream being the journey. you and i were just there not long ago senator sessions. that country is about three years ahead of us in coming through with all these regulations and continuing a war like our president obama has had since he's been in office.

and there -- their costs for electricity now has doubled since they started that program three years ago. doubled. it is now three times the cost per kill watt hour of what we have here in this country. we know american people know it will be expensive and is very alarming that we have to do this. you know, to stay within my time frame i'm going to have to submit the whole statement for the record. but i want to get, if this is true, if we're now in a spell, in a period of time 15 years where there's been no increase in temperature, and now saying that this might be the coldest year -- weather of the year, all that is a matter of record, then why is this all of a sudden surfaced as an issue. and i would say why it surfaced. there's a guy right here, his name is tom steyer, s-t-e-y-e-r, he has come out and documented -- he's a multibillionaire, he's going to

put $100 million in the legislative process to try to resurrect global warming as an issue. $50 million of this is his own money, and he'll raise the other 50. i can tell you right now it's not going to work. i know it's a lot of money, and this will be going to candidates who are going to be supporting global warming and all of that stuff. so we know that it's going to be -- it's going to have an impact. it is a lot of money but the people of america won't buy it, and i would say this, i've already made an announcement, mr. chairman, that -- and there's a possibility i could be chairing this committee again, that when these regulations are finalized, i'm going to offer a cra, congressional review act on each one of them because that's the only way that we can have people get on record, either supporting or rejecting this and i have a feeling that we're going to be able to stop it, in spite of -- by the way, this article be put in the record at the conclusion of my opening

statement. >> thank you. without objection, your time has expired. >> thank you mr. chairman. >> we're now going to hear from senator tester. delighted to have you with us today, both in your role as a u.s. senator and observer of facts on the ground in montana, and as a generational farmer. >> thank you, chairman merkley, and ranking member. i would like to say before i get into my prepared remarks, i don't know tom steyer from a bar of soap but i would be more than happy to work with anybody to put some transparency on the dark money that comes into this elections. and i know this isn't a hearing about elections and dark money. but if we want to save our democracy a think that's the first step. i think we could get to the bottom of a lot of this stuff that's going on as far as influence and political agenda here in washington, d.c. with that i want to thank -- >> as my name was used. this isn't dark. this is light. this is something everybody knows. it's out there in all the publications. that means that much to some

people. i just want to clarify that. >> then let's get rid of that and the dark money, too. mr. chairman, i would first of all appreciate -- appreciate you having me here today, along with ranking member wicker, feels like we should be on cross fire, roger, but we'll do it here. look, i'm not a lawyer, i'm not a scientist, i'm a u.s. senator, but more importantly i'm a farmer. the impacts of climate change are felt far and wide and i believe we need to take responsible steps to mitigate the impacts. what those steps are, some came out by the epa yesterday, some folks have some other ideas. i'm more than happy to listen to them. the epa released a proposal for reducing carbon emissions from existing power plants. they went with a state-based solution. i think that's smart. to our problems, and i will work to ensure this proposal works for montanans in my home state. i think refusing to act to protect clean air and clean

water is not a viable option. i think in the long term, and in the short term it's going to cost jobs and a way of life. as i said a minute ago i'm a third generation farmer. i farm in north central montana. i have seen the impacts of climate change firsthand. this does not mean i have people that farm the land. this means that i do it with my wife. we finish seeding two weeks ago last saturday. this piece of land was homesteaded by my grandfather and we have farmed it for the last 40 years, my wife and i. my folks, 35 years before that. and my grandparents 35 years before that. for the average american, particularly those of us from rural america the political conversation about climate change seems worlds away. for us, we have had warmer winters. we have had more extreme weather events. and there are already presenting new challenges for our way of life. do i say those statements because i read an article in some magazine? no. i say it because this is what i

have seen on the farm. let me give you an example. my dad farmed from 1943 to 1978 and never got a hailstorm that allowed him to collect more than his premium that he paid for that hail insurance. i've been hailed out four times in the last 35 years. and this month alone, the month -- i should say last month, we're in june now, in the month of may, we have seen severe hailstorms all over the state of montana, totally unregulated, totally out of character. these are storms that usually would hit in july or august. they're storms that break out windows in cars. they break fences. golf ball sized hail or bigger. and we've had them up in my neck of the woods just south of my place, to down in billings. 230 miles south of that. at the turn 1999/2000/2001 we've got a reservoir on the place my dad built in the late '40s, when he dug it, it filled up with

water. in '99, 2000, 2001 it dried up for the first time ever. if you take a look at what's going on as far as disaster assistance, and i appreciate some of the comments made by the senators on the roster, on how this could affect our timber industry -- i'm talking about the now epa regulations, how this could affect agriculture, in the last two years -- 20 years ago the forest service spent 13% of its budget on fighting fires and i can almost guarantee you that budget 20 years ago was a heck of a lot smaller than it is today and they spent 13% of it. now it's 40%. and they still have to transfer half a billion dollars to cover costs. we're going to spend more than $15 billion on hurricane sandy relief efforts alone. i cannot think of a time we've had a hurricane hit new york. but it did with san zi. i think today's hearing appropriately focused on

experiences of farmest, ranchers, foresters, men and women that they're going through. unfortunately the stories are often overlooked, underreported or not reported at all. as a nation i think we need to start paying attention because these experiences are important if we're going to have a debate here in washington, d.c. and we're going to listen. scientists tell us the climate change will bring shorter, warmer winters, and in montana i see it. when i was younger, frequent bone chilling winds whipped across the prairies, 30 below for two weeks at a time was not an exaggeration. now, it seems like if we have temperatures below zero, it is the exception. do you want me to cut it off now, by the way? has this been five minutes already? my god. >> sorry about that. time moves quickly but i think we'd like to hear from you. >> i apologize. i usually don't do this. but changes in the weather are forcing different ways to operate our farm. and to be honest with you,

it's -- it's more difficult to figure out how. we haven't had a gentle rain this month of may. may is our wettest month. i planted that we finished planting those crops two weeks ago, they're not going to come out of the ground until we get some moisture. this is pretty abnormal. we've had droughts before, but this is -- this is abnormal stuff. the end of bitter winters you think gosh it's less soil you're going to have to heat the house or propane or wood or whatever you're doing but the fact is those winters and the lack of cold winters has allowed a little beast called the saw fly to add up, if you don't deal with the saw fly by adding another operation to how you -- ahead of time it can take as much of the crop as a hailstorm would, three quarters of it quite easily. it's time sensitive. the dead trees many of which litter our national forests you go south of flathead lake our forests are dead. combining with the historic drought, and the wildfires, season is longer, it's hotter,

and it's rougher. and it costs more money to fight. these stories go down the list and i can just tell you that a couple years ago, we flew in to down around by billings, they were having record floods. the next year, same people whose houses were under water one year were being burn out the next. same land. i don't know what's going on. i don't know if the air's getting warmer. i don't know if we're just in a cycle. but i can tell you we can talk about all the things that need to be done here. we can talk about how it's going to impact farmers and ranchers and sportsmen and all that. but if we end up passing on a climate to our kids that doesn't allow our kids to move forward with an economy that helps support, i think we're making a huge mistake. now, last year we had a record crop.

i can tell you right now it's going to be a pretty open summer for me if we don't get some rain pretty damn quick. those kind of variations in weather farmers always talk about as being normal. but this is -- this is above anything that i have ever seen in my 57 years on this place. and by the way, i live within 100 miles of that place till i got this job. so that's where i have spent my entire life. and i have seen things happen in our climate that i have never, ever, ever seen before. maybe it's just happenstance. maybe it's just choice. maybe if we ignore it, it will go away. but i think that if we can put a man on the moon in ten years, we can certainly, going off of 2005 standards, reduce the amount of co-2 going into the air by 30% in 25 years. i don't think it's that much of

a stretch. is coal going away? i don't think so. not for awhile. by 2030, nearly a third of our energy will still be coal. and i don't think that's a bad thing. so, mr. chairman, i appreciate you having this hearing, ranking member wicker, you know that i have a tremendous respect for you and i appreciate contribution to this. i think we have a choice, as people who serve in the senate and the house. we can do nothing, or we can try to find solutions that help drive our economy forward and address issues of climate. if we do nothing, and we're wrong, think about that. just think about that. it means there's going to be a lot of hungry people. with that sobering thought, i will say thank you for the opportunity to testify. i very much appreciate it. i apologize i ran over. by damn near double. but such is life. ashe will have to cut his way back.

>> senator, thank you very much for your testimony. and giving this district, on-the-ground impression of these effects from hail to fires to new pests, to fewer, as you put it, bone-chilling winds. indeed the point of this hearing was to hear about effects on the ground and we're going to now have witnesses to take a look across america, really appreciate your giving your sense. thank you. i'd like to invite director dan ashe of the u.s. fish and wildlife service to join us. dan has had a long career in public service. prior to being director he served as services deputy director for policy. as a science adviser and as the chief of the national wildlife refuge system. mr. ashe spent 13 years as professional staff on the former committee on merchant marine and fisheries in the house of representatives. and earned his graduate degree in marine affairs from the university of washington.

he is here today to give us perspective on how we can expect to see climate change impacting our national resources, and our key to sustaining our fishing and hunting economies. it's terrific to have you. welcome. >> thank you chairman merkley. ranking member wicker. it's a privilege to be here before this subcommittee, and thank you for the opportunity to testify today, really, and to have america's sportsmen and women. as americans we are extraordinarily blessed. among these blessings are the natural landscapes, and the healthy abundant native fish and wildlife that they support. and today, blessings are largely due to the leadership, and the foresight of yesterday's hunters and anglers, good people, and professional managers who found -- who found the will, and the ability to face the great

challenges of their day. it may have been a dust bowl in the 1930s, or pesticide use in the -- in the '50s and '60s. and wetlands destruction in the '70s and '80s. but these women and men found the will and the way to work with congress and others to address those challenges. do i'm really proud of my country and colleagues in public service. it was in 1990 i was a staff member, committee staff member in the house of representatives, worked with the house merchant marine and fisheries committee, the house science committee and others and this committee in the senate to enact the global climate change research program act. and then a few years ago we worked with our state colleagues and other partners to develop the national fish, wildlife and plants adaptation strategy, and

just recently we saw the most recent national climate assessment and then yesterday yesterday the epa proposing acceptable and effective regulation of greenhouse gas emissions and so i feel like our country finally has the information, and the wherewithal and it's finding the will to address this great challenge. and hunting and fish iing are vital components of the nation's economy especially in rural areas. in 2011 americans spent $145 billion on wildlife related recreation, nearly 1% of the nation's gross domestic product and the changing climate system is affecting hunters and anglers today. and it is darkening the prospect for hunters and anglers tomorrow. shorter winters and earlier springs are disrupting delegate water fowl migrations tha