>> up next, how to cut off funding for the isis terrorist group. a british defense hearing on the foreign-policy and how to deal with isis. a conversation with the world bank president. >> the center for american progress will hold a panel discussion on post secondary education funding. education officials including the undersecretary with recommendations for state reinvestment and public colleges and universities. live beginning at 9:30 a.m. on c-span 2. e-mails we the recently received from our viewers -- gene wrote --

christine writes -- and robert wrote --

continue to let us know what you think about the programs you are watching. call us at -- e-mail us at -- or send a tweet at -- and likeconversation us on facebook and follow us on twitter. >> he is the treasury undersecretary for terrorism and financial and he talked about the u.s. treasury to disrupt the financing of the islamic state also known as isis. he refused the source of revenue strategies for disrupting down. he spoke at a forum. this is an hour.

>> good morning. i am marwan muasher, director of the middle east program. i want to welcome you to carnegie and thank you for joining us for this timely discussion on u.s. efforts to disrupt the financial network that support islamic state of iraq and the levant, what is called isis. i see there is enough interest in this room for this issue. overflow. public attention has focused on the military efforts to degrade isis, there is another effort being led by the treasury department, which is focused on shutting down the flow of money to isis from outside sources and through smuggling networks.

it has been estimated that isis country produces over 50,000 barrels of oil for day, which can provide between one and $2 million per day of revenue. this is in addition to the funds the group collects from activities such as extortion, kidnapping, and illegal surcharges. isis is considered the wealthiest terrorist organization. to discuss the strategy to try to cut off these funds, we are honored to have david cohen with us today. he is the undersecretary for terrorism and financial intelligence at the treasury department where he leads the

department in enforcing, regulatory and intelligence functions aimed at identifying and disrupting financial support to international terrorist organizations and other illicit actors posing a threat to national security. he will discuss the terrorist financing challenge posed by isis and the measures the treasury department and other agencies are taking to a dress this thread. following his remark we will open the floor to questions from the audience. for those who want to join the conversation online, we will be live tweeting this event using the #disruptingisis, one word. please join me in welcoming treasury undersecretary david cohen. [applause] >> good morning and thank you for that kind introduction and

to the endowment for hosting here today. it is an honor to have the opportunity to lend my voice to the ongoing dialogue fostered by carnegie and the middle east studies program. before i begin my remarks, i would note our sympathy and prayers with the people of canada. we are still working on gathering all of the information about the attacks yesterday and are working with our canadian counterparts. this is a tragic reminder of the need to remain vigilant in the face of terror. our friends in ottawa will have whatever support they need from our national security teams in the united states. i come this morning to discuss the endemic problem of violence

extremism. the terrorist group known as islamic state of iraq and the levant. i will describe the u.s. and international efforts my team is leading to undermine their financial strength as part of a strategy to disrupt and defeat isil. let me briefly review why we are so focused on isil. they have slaughtered thousands of innocent people who did not subscribe to their theology. they have persecuted religious minorities and they rape women and girls. they have brutally murdered aid workers and journalists who travel to syria just to bring a small measure of relief to the people or to tell their story. the vast majority of their victims are muslims.

isil threatens core u.s. interests and american facilities in iraq and our regional allies including turkey and lebanon, who are already strained by the ripple effects in syria. it is attracting so many foreign fighters and securing a safe haven, isis could pose a direct threat to citizens of the united states and our allies outside the middle east. a terrorist organization with a stated desire to kill innocent people abroad must be confronted. that is why the international community has come together to stop this threat. the president has capped a special envoy with a broad

coalition, 60 partners strong from the middle east to europe, behind a strategy to degrade isis' capabilities and ultimately defeat it. isil has grabbed the world attention for its ambitions and astounding brutality, but also for another reasoning, it substantial wealth. their primary funding tactics enable it to generate tens of millions of dollars per month through the sale of stolen oil, the ransoming of kidnap victims, theft and distortion, and donations from supporters outside of syria and iraq. it is part of a broader strategy to degrade isil, we are intensifying our focus on undermining their finances. this is a whole of government effort.

we are working closely with our counterparts in the state department, the department of defense, and the intelligence community. we're linked up with international counterparts. we hosted a meeting with the state department and brought together over 20 countries to identify financial measures to undermine isis and the illegitimate assad regime. our efforts to combat the financing will take time. we have no silver bullet, no secret weapon. this will be a sustained fight and we are in the early stages. one thing is certain. so long as isis terrorizes the people of iraq and syria, we will remain committed to degrading its financial strength.

in 2004, the office was created and charged with developing financial tools to combat financing, reflecting the recognition that one way to forestall attacks is to deprive organizations of money. through the application of sanctions, cooperation with foreign partners, and enhancements to international financial transparencies, we have made it harder for terror groups to raise and store and use funds. in many respects, our campaign will build on our work over the past 10 years and resemble our previous campaigns. to some extent isis poses a different challenge. it has amassed wealth and the revenue sources have a different composition than those of other terrorist organizations.

isil devise a small share of its funds from deep pocket owners and does not depend on moving money across international borders. isis obtains the vast majority of its revenues through local terrorist activities. just as isis realize a new marginals to pose itself, we are adapting our techniques to combat the financial activities. before turning to the steps we're taking, and the detail these sources of revenue. first they have raised a significant amounts of money from selling oil extracts from field in syria and iraq. they have tapped into long-standing black markets connecting traders in and around the area. after extracting the oil, they sell to smugglers who transport the oil outside of their

strongholds. these smugglers move oil in a variety of ways. we also understand that isil controls oil refineries and earn some revenue from the sale of refine petroleum products. so who is buying this oil? as of last month, isil was selling oil at discounted prices to a variety of middlemen, including some from turkey, who transfer or the oil to be resold. some of the oil has been sold to kurds in iraq and resold into turkey. it seems the syrian government has made an arrangement to purchase oil from isil. it is difficult to get resized estimates on the value of these transactions.

we estimate that beginning in mid-june, isil has earned $1 million a day from these oil sales. there are good indications that efforts have begun to impair isil's ability to generate oil from energy smuggling. the supply network is threatened and depriving it of fuel to sell or to use itself. our partners in the region including turkey are committed to preventing isil-derived oil from crossing their borders. isil's ability to produce and smuggle oil had been significantly hampered. isil also kidnaps innocent civilians to profit from ransoms paid to obtain the release.

isil did not pioneer kidnapping for ransom. it has been around for thousands of years. other organizations also rely on ransom payments as a key revenue source. kidnapping for ransom is one of the most significant threats today. these ransom payments are irregular, but each one can be a significant boon. they released captured journalists from several countries this spring. in return, they received several multimillion dollar payments. isil has taken it at least $20 million in ransoms this year. like its predecessor, isil raises money up to several million dollars for month

through an extortion racket. they extract payments from those who pass through, conduct this is in, or seek to live in territory where it operates. accounts of terrorist going homes to homes the many cash at gunpoint. a grocery store owner was warned with a bomb outside his shop. others have seen their relatives kidnapped. religious minorities have been forced to pay special tribute. when customers make cash withdrawals, isil has demanded as much as 10% of the value. this is not taxation in return for services or real protection. it is theft, pure and simple. the money takeover is being exchanged for the temporary absence of harm. isil also profits from a range of other criminal activities.

they rob banks. they loot and sell antiquities. they sell abducted girls and women as sex slaves. isil derives some funding from wealthy donors. even though they do not rely heavily on external donor networks, it maintains important links to financiers in the gulf. isil's revenue streams are diverse and deep. with the important exception of some state-sponsored terrorist organizations, isil is probably the best funded terrorist organization we have confronted. understanding this effort will take time and broad collaboration, we are well-positioned to degrade their financial strength.

our strategy involves three elements. we are working to disrupt their revenue streams to deny it money in the first place. we aim to limit what they can do with the funds they collect by restricting their access to the international financial system. we will impose sanctions on their senior leadership and financial facilitators to disrupt their ability to operate. the first element of our strategy is working to cut off isil's main sources of funding, ransom payments, extortion and crime. to disrupt the marketed oil, we will target for financial sanctions anyone who trades in their stolen oil. it is true that oil moves in

illicit networks that are largely outside the formal economy. at some point, the oil is acquired by someone cooperates in the legitimate economy for makes use of the financial system. he has a bank account. his trust may be insured. all that makes isil oil facilitators vulnerable. the traders and refiners and anyone else that handles their oil should know we are hard at work identifying them and we have the tools at hand to stop them. we can cut them off and freeze the assets and we can make it difficult for them to find a bank anywhere that will touch their money or process their transaction. in combating their fundraising through oil sales, we will leverage the reluctance of banks around the world to facilitate

the financing of terrorism. we are working closely with others to enhance the ability of our partners in the region to choke off cross-border oil smuggling routes and to identify those involved in the smuggling networks. the turkish authorities have made commitments to combat whatever oil smuggling occurs in their territory. our military is playing a significant role in degrading the source of funding through airstrikes. to prevent isil from raising funds through ransom, we are redoubling our efforts to transform -- against a payment it ransom into a more widely adopted practice. it has been policy to refuse the payment of ransoms or make other concessions to hostage takers.

this policy rests on the premise confirmed by experience that explicit session policy reduces the frequency of kidnappings by eliminating the incentive to take hostages in the first place. in the context of hostage-taking by terrorists, this policy has greater force. we know that organizations use ransom money to fund the full range of their violent activities. refusing to pay ransom makes it less likely that americans will be taken hostage but it deprives terrorists of funding critical to their deadly aspirations and operations. we maintain this policy not because we are coldhearted. the president -- we use all of our military intelligence, law enforcement to secure the release of american hostages.

the attempts made this summer by u.s. forces to rescue hostages being held reflect this commitment. but very simply, if we are to protect our citizens and avoid bankrolling our adversaries, every country must lament a no ransom policy. this norm is beginning to take place. last year that payment of ransom was rejected by the g-8. this year members of the security council have adopted resolutions reaffirming their shared commitment to seek the safe relief of hostages without making monetary or political concessions. going forward, we remain dedicated to freeing those taken and will continue to urge partner nations to subscribe to a no-ransom policy. we will look to use our sanctions authority against those who demand or receive ransoms on the half of terrorist organizations.

we are concerned about the external donor networks. to prevent isil from raising funds, we will identify the financial supporters and target them from sanctions. we have focused on disrupting the funding networks of isil and its predecessor. we have applied sanctions against more than two dozen individuals over the past 10 or so years. we will continue to target those who would exploit the suffering of innocent people in syria and iraq, to raise money for their agendas. in the months ahead with plan to accelerate our efforts to identify targets for sanctions and take actions through our counterterrorism authority. president obama led the un security council in passing a binding resolution to stem the flow of foreign terrorist

fighters into and out of iraq and syria. security council 2178 aims to prevent and suppress the flow of foreign fighters and money to isil. we're working with others to implement it swiftly. we are closely with our friends in the gulf, are partners in the anti-isil coalition, to make sure they have the tools in place and they all use these tools effectively. we appreciate the close collaboration and strong steps taken by the saudi's to combat isil financing. even though isil does not rely heavily on their donor model, that is no reason to relax our efforts in this area. particularly as we make progress in disrupting their current sources of income and as isil gains additional prominence, we

must be prepared for the possibility that wealthy extremist will increasingly seek to fund it. as for disrupting the evident they generate from extortion, we recognize the tools are not well suited to the task. we will identify and designate the individuals who oversee their extortion networks, calling attention to those who are brutalized the people of iraq and syria. our experience drives home the point that shutting down the revenue flow ultimately will require breaking its hold on territory. other lines of effort are focused on this objective. even where financial tools

cannot cut off certain streams, we still have a role to play. and that brings me to the second key of our strategy. as we work to disrupt isil's income, we need to collect -- we need to impair ability to collect funds. isil's ability to make the use of the funds it collects depends on the sick -- on the banking system. operating in cash is cumbersome and risky. cash is bulky, vulnerable to theft, and requires complicated logistics to transport. isil will have a hard time finding external operations, -- funding external operations without access to the international financial system.

we are working to limit isil's ability to transact through the banking systems. scores of bank branches are located in territories where isil currently operates. through cooperation with iraqi authorities, bank coordinators, and international financial community, we aim to prevent isil from using those bank branches. the private sector is playing a key role in this element of our strategy. the bank secrecy act provides the u.s. government with valuable insight into financial activity in areas where i still operates. we carefully -- where isil operates. we carefully review these and disseminate information to the appropriate authorities. the third element of our strategy draws on our time sensitive approach to countering the financing of terrorism. we will continue to dismantle isil's financial foundation, targeting its leadership, supporters, and financial facilitators.

running a terrorist organization, especially one that spans hundreds of miles, is both costly and bureaucratically challenging. in order keep track of all its revenues and costs, isil depends on complex measuring networks, with cfo like figures at the top. as we identify those individuals, we will expose and desecrate them. we have seen from our fight against isis and other organizations that can bring their -- that hampering their funds will make it harder for isil to conduct commercial and financial activities and clearly identifies for the international community who stands behind this evil organization. we've stepped up our designations of isil officials, those based in iraq and syria and their financial supporters outside the area. on september 24, treasury

sanctioned two high-profile individuals associated with isil, a financial facilitator who arranged a $2 million donation from the gulf, and his senior military commander. both were in syria soliciting donations, from -- procuring military equipment, and employing foreign fighters. these designations will not on their own stop the individuals, but they and designations the, frustrate isl -- isil's ability to attract money and fighters. i would like to make one final point about our campaign against isil's financial funding. we should not confuse funding with strength. a terrorist group's overall financial strength turns not just on its income, but it expenses and the degree to which it can dedicate its resources to violent purposes.

isil operates within certain real constraints. isil's territorial ambitions are a financial burden. attempting to govern the cities, towns, territory in iraq and syria where it currently operates, much less the motoring some modicum of services -- much less the liver and some modicum of services to the people it ekes to subjugate -- it seeks to subjugate is expensive. no one expects isil to deliver the same level of services that the legitimate iraqi government, the official iraqi budget for the provinces where isil currently operates is well over $2 billion. that far outstrips isil's levering and does not include the price tag for the territory it seeks to dominate in syria. isil cannot possibly meet the most basic needs of the people that it seeks to rule.

as we make progress in diminishing isil's revenues and its freedoms to use them, we will further exploited vulnerability. the consequences of isil's inability to meet the cost of governing, by the way, were articulated very well in a recent report by -- with time, patience, and close international operation, the steps i have outlined today will help undermine isil's financial foundation. i must stress again however that the campaign against isil's finances will require more than just financial tools. this is primarily because, given that isil is enriching itself locally, cutting off one key source of funds will require dislodging it from territories in which it operates, but more broadly, even as this campaign progresses, we recognize that the only solutions to the

conflicts in iraq and syria are political in nature. the hateful ideology propagated by isil must be countered by tolerant, economically vibrant societies and governments that rule in an inclusive manner. these are long-term goals that the united states is deeply committed to fostering. so, while we work towards lasting solutions, treasury will continue to deploy innovative strategies to disrupt isil's finances. together with our partners in the u.s. government and across the globe, we will do great and ultimately defeat isil -- we will degrade and ultimately defeat isil. thank you. [applause] >> thank you very much. let me start the discussion with a couple of questions and then open it up to the audience. you just returned from a trip to qatar and saudi arabia.

both countries where individuals continue to donate money to isil. what was your message to them, and how do you assess the state of fund-raising in the gulf for such organizations? >> that's right. i just last week was in saudi arabia and qatar. the gulf is enormously important in the anti-isil coalition, including the counter-financing aspect of this. we've made no secret over the years of our concerns with financing for terrorist organizations coming out of the gulf. i think we have made some significant progress in the gulf, but there is obviously more work to be done. if you go through each critical country individually, if you look at saudi arabia, for instance --

my meetings there were very good. the saudi's are deeply committed to ensuring, to the best of their ability, that no money goes to isil or al qaeda or on al nusra front. they have made enormous strides in combating terrorist financing and are committed to ensuring that isil is not able to raise funds in the kingdom. in the uae, which i didn't visit on this most recent trip, though i'm a frequent visitor, they also are steadfastly committed to preventing funding for isil from nusra front. we have a very good, close relationship with the iraqis -- with the emiratis.

we have initiated a bilateral task force where we will work more closely on combating terrorist financing. i think that's a very positive development and one that reflects an ongoing commitment by the emeratis. >> with respect to qatar and kuwait, i didn't make it to kuwait on this most recent trip. but general allen, who is spearheading this overall effort and is just embarking on a tour that will include kuwait and qatar, i have, in the past noted -- i have in the past noted that both kuwait and qatar are jurist -- jurisdictions with suspicion -- with specific concerns to nusra front and to isil. i think both countries have more work to do.

in qatar, where i was last week, i had very good meetings with senior leadership. we discussed how best how best to address this problem. the emir proposed a new law to try and ensure that -- it is not used to fund terrorism. there are u.s. and u.n.-designated terrorist financiers in qatar that have not been acted against under qatari law. the u.n. designated in august -- are both residents in qatar.

with respect to kuwait, they are home to a number of u.s. and u.n. designated terrorist financiers. they also have the laws and institutions in place to combat terrorist financing in kuwait. one thing we are particularly concerned about and two of the recent designees both were raising funds through social media. through twitter appeals, in particular. they are raising funds not necessarily from within kuwait, but are also reaching out to others, including in saudi arabia to make appeals to raise funds. one of the areas where we are quite concerned is ensuring that in particular people who have been designated by the u.s. and

the u.n. are disrupted and unable to continue their fundraising activities. as i stay, i think there is more work to do, both in qatar and kuwait. we been deeply engaged with both countries for a number of years. we have seen others make really substantial progress in combating terrorist financing. we are going to continue to work as closely as possible with our partners in the gulf on this issue. >> how would you address critics of u.s. policy who say that this is not america's fight and that it should be better left to countries in the region and not to the united states? how do you see the campaign progressing in the coming years? what would you look for to determine whether the strategy is working? >> first of all, this is certainly america's fight to some extent.

what isil is doing threatens for u.s. interest -- threatens core u.s. interests. whether it is the interest of some of our very close partners in the region, jordan, lebanon, turkey, it is a significant u.s. interest. as well as the concern that isil is attempting to create a safe haven for terrorism across that suite of territory, which is attracting foreign fighters. we have seen something on the order of 15,000 foreign fighters flow into the area from 80 or so different countries, including dozens of americans. it is deeply in our interest to confront isil, combat isil,

defeat isil. but it is not our fight alone. the size of the anti-isil coalition, 60 countries and organizations coming together to combat isil, 10 of which are involved in military strikes, i think demonstrates that this is viewed quite properly as a threat to many countries around the world. and then, as to how we will judge success of our particular efforts to address isil financing -- as i said, this is going to be a long-term effort. it is going to involve work that the treasury department does in designations, in exposing the networks. it will involve work of partners in other countries, turkey,

elsewhere, where we are very much engaged. my deputy was in turkey a couple of weeks ago. general allen was there last week. we are continuing very close communication with the turks on these issues. and it will require an enhanced understanding of the funding networks that were combating -- that we are combating. whether it is external donation networks -- i should note that we are very proud of the treasury department that we have in-house intelligence agency. we are the only finance ministry in the world that has our own intelligence agency.

what these folks do is help us understand the financial networks. they got dial-up -- they develop financial networks. it is anonymously important that the intelligence community help us understand -- it is a normal sleep important that the current -- it is enormously important that the intelligence community help us understand. i think we will see over time that we are degrading each of these lines of financing for i saw -- for isil. isil has a fair amount of money today. what is critically important is that we do everything we can to prevent this from being recurring. -- recurring revenue. one-time revenue that we can

address is one thing. we want to make sure that, as they have significant expenses, that they don't have a ready stream of recurring revenue. >> let's open it up. we have about 20 minutes. we will take questions in batches of three. please keep it short. >> [inaudible] >> a couple of questions. how would you assess what you've done so far? also, you talked about how people in the gulf -- how some governments of the gulf have new tools that you want to make sure that they know how to use. what are these tools? you were talking about how you were trying to come up with novel ideas to raise funds. you have outlined anything new. you've always had designations. what is new about what you are doing? >> i am with the national endowment for democracy. i want to raise your attention for a few things. what about informal companies in turkey.

-- in turkey? [indiscernible] one thing you didn't mention, agriculture. if you see in iraq, 80% of the wheat and corn is in the area. that's a lot of money. did you look in this area? >> a question from the back. yes. please. >> i'm from the international center for terrorism studies. a big method of combating isis

has been supplying materials and weapons to the syrian rebels and to the peshmerga. should a priority be put on ensuring these supplies do not fall onto -- into isil's hands and put less pressure on to their financial coffers? >> let's start with these. >> we are in the early stages of these efforts. some things that have been useful to the designations of both military and financial facilitators, which builds on the work that we have been doing for a number of years to identify people who are related to hui as well as isil. this was helpful in my recent trip to the gulf, the highlight work that can be done. this is not going to be a connector size where we are

going to, at the end of every month, be able to produce a balance sheet that shows what isil's finances look like. this is going to be a steady effort that will do -- will degrade isil's finances over time. the other area where i think we have seen -- and i noted we have seen some progress already is not something that we've done at the treasury department. it is something that our colleagues in the department of defense and their partners have accomplished in terms of strikes

against isil oil facilities. oil refineries in particular. it impedes their ability to self refined products and makes it more difficult for them to fuel their vehicles among both military and -- vehicles, both military and vehicles that may be smuggling oil. i think those are efforts -- the one other answer to your question about what's new -- we've also begun conversations with the iraqi government and with other financial regulatory authorities. about our concerns with bank branches that are within the isil controlled territory. it is a difficult problem. our interest is not in shutting down all economic activity in the areas where i sold -- were isil currently operates. they are subjugating huge swaths of the population, millions of people who are still trying to live their lives. banks are important lubricants for the economy. at the same time, we are very concerned about isil possibility

-- isil's ability to co-opt or coerced the bank employees into using the bank as a way for them -- to co-opt or coerce the bank employees into using the bank as a way for them to operate. i don't know if this is new or old, but a new manifestation of the core competency, which is working with financial counterparts, both in the iraqi government and outside, to see what can be done to try and prevent isil from making use of these branches. on the question of the informal means to move funds -- not everything moves through the financial formal sector. we have done it in afghanistan. good intelligence on who is involved in these activities. it requires the cooperation and collaboration with partners in

the region. you cited one end of that transaction was in saudi arabia. i think they are fully engaged in the effort to combat isil financing. we will work with partners in the region on these issues. with respect to the question on agriculture and isil selling weapons.

they are able to engage in activities within the territory where they are currently operating, whether it is stealing crops and selling them for coming into weapons that have been left behind -- selling them or coming into weapons that have been left behind, that is all activity that we are aware of, that there are ways to address, particularly if it is going beyond the borders of where they operate. but, fundamentally, it's going to require pushing back isil from the territory where it operates and freeing the lands where they are, as well as -- that will work on the extortion networks. it will work on the fulfilling

of crops they are stealing. >> could you please talk a little bit about -- you said there had been some success in your conversations with countries, i'm guessing primarily european countries, about no longer paying ransoms to isil and other terror groups. could you be more specific about which countries are coming around? >> barbara slaven. how do you deal with the fact that there are mixed motivations on the part of the members of the coalition, with many of them putting a priority on getting rid of bashar assad, particularly turkey? there are many folks who seem to have an ambivalence about the activities of the islamic state. if i could also throw in an iran question -- how much progress have you made in setting up financial channels

for people who want to do legitimate business with iran? will there be a blessed channel between an american and an iranian bank if we get a comprehensive nuclear agreement? >> in the back. please, sir. >> thank you. i had a quick question regarding the oil trade. you said that some of the oil providers from the territory that isil is controlling is sold to kurds in iraq and to turkey. could you clarify what percentage of this royally screwed and what percentage is refined -- of this is crude and what percentage is refined? what is your position on this issue? you said you are working -- there with the "wall street journal congo to follow up on

the oil trade as smuggling. what is your position? [indiscernible] >> i am with "the wall street journal." to follow up on the oil trade, has been u.s. identified what routes are being used question stopped?ould they be how is that route going to be stopped? >> i will do this in reverse order.

i didn't mean to suggest vessels like ships, what we've seen our tankers -- are truck tankers, not ship tankers. in response to the question to how the oil is moving, what the smugglers look like, what we're doing about it, i don't have much more detail that i can provide today beyond what a marty said. -- beyond what i've already said. i will note this. these smuggling routes have existed for a long period of time, long before isil was

active in the territory. what may have been a willingness to look the other way, to see -- to not be knowledgeable about the origin of the oil that these smuggling networks are using -- i think these smuggling networks, it's not just oil. there are other commodities that have for dozens or hundreds of years moved through these smuggling networks. the ability of people at the end of these networks to be unaware of the origin of the oil may have been -- people stealing oil from the syrian or iraqi governments and selling it through these networks. what is different is that we now know and they now know that this oil -- the trade in this oil

fundamentally funds this terrorist organization. what may have been a willingness to look the other way in the past is something that cannot continue going forward. we will try to emphasize that message rhetorically and through actions as we identify the people involved in those networks. with respect to competing ambivalence or what have you, i will leave the diplomacy to the diplomats. i don't sense any ambivalence whatsoever among the key partners on the importance of

combating isil financing. even with respect to what i was saying on qatar and kuwait, neither of those countries are saying to me that they are indifferent to the funding of isil coming from the territory. both of those countries are aware of -- the problem. i didn't answer teh question about the tools. let me answer that. the qataris have a new law regarding charities. they have long-standing legislation that allows them to designate individuals and designate terrorist organizations, as they are obligated to do under un security council resolutions. the kuwaitis also have both the

institutions and the legal framework to do essentially what we do, which is to take administrative action against terrorist financiers. those are the tools that are available. we are going to continue to work with both jurisdictions so that they employ those tools as effectively as possible. on the question about ransoms and where we've had success, i do think it is notable that, in the last year plus, you had the g-8 come out a very strong statement about the payment of ransoms and then you had two un security council resolutions that, one, specifically focused on ransom payments and the other, in the context of the foreign terrorist fighters, also noted the importance of not paying ransoms to terrorists. that is a very significant declaration of adherence to a no

ransoms policy. the trick is translating that into practice and being committed as a matter of fact to a policy and approach that is becoming a broader international norm. that requires some very hard choices to be made and recognition of the importance of adopting a no ransoms policy as a means to protect all of our citizens. as i noted in my remarks, isil received something on the order of $20 million in ransom payments. that means that not everybody has committed to the no ransoms policy as certainly as we have. the british are, too.

they have, like us, long adhered both in word and in practice to a no ransoms policy. there's more work to be done. >> thank you so much. please join me in may i ask you please to stacy and until he is able to leave? -- to stay seated. [captions copyright national cable satellite corp. 2014] by thening performed national captioning institute, which is responsibile for its

caption content and accuracy. visit ncicap.org.] thehen a conversation with world bank president. later, q and a with documentary filmmaker rory kennedy. tomorrow, the center for american progress will hold a panel discussion on post secondary education funding. education officials including education undersecretary tedd forhell for recommendations reinvestment in public colleges and universities. live beginning at 8:00 a.m. baker,dith atwell president and ceo of the wireless association. 0 i was at the commerce department and this is repurposed singh spectrums under the department of defense and lessons learned has been going wonderfully.

the spectrum is internationally harmonized thomas 65 megahertz. we are so excited and then we are going to turn around and have the broadcast incentive option. that's really going well. the greenhill report that values the spectrum has really turned the discussion from policy to a business decision which is where it needed to turn to. we are excited about those options. i'm certain our carriers will come back and it will be win-win for everyone. easternht at 8:00 p.m. on "the communicators" on c-span2. >> the british defense committee held a hearing to discuss u.k. foreign policy and the threat is isis. witnesses include the former nato deputy ally commander for europe and the former multinational division commander for iraq.

this is one hour 50 minutes. >> we will look at the second round of evidence on reports on our inquiry into iraq and syria and we're very lucky to have with us today dr. douglas porch. dr. porch for those that don't know him, is one of the most distinguished u.s. academics on the subject of military strategy and counterinsurgency. he is currently the distinguished professor at the naval postgraduate school in monterey, california. he was professor of strategy at naval war college in newport, rhode island. taught at united states marine corps university in quantico and u.s. army war college as well as the navy defense college in rome.

his most recent book, is specifically on counterinsurgency which is essential to our inquiry because all these deal with surge and what general petraeus's attempt in 2006 and 2009 with the situation in iraq. welcome doctor porch. to begin, just wondered what you felt are the options which are potentially available to the international coalition and its partners in response to the current crisis in iraq and syria and which you think would be most effective? >> ok. now let me say two things at the outset. first, disclaimer. i am now retired from u.s. government service. so what i say is, my own opinion and not the opinion of the naval postgraduate school or department of navy or department of defense. from the second thing i think i have to point out, i'm not a

middle east expert. i do military strategy, military history. that's my area of expertise. so i think you should keep that in mind. but, obviously since we've been involved a lot in iraq and afghanistan and this, my students, who were midlevel officers, that is, 0-3s and o-4s and one of the motivations writing my book and coming back from these two place, telling me, sir, this stuff doesn't work. i also lost two students to green on blue as they called it in afghanistan. i have seen their marriages collapse as a result of repeated deemployments in these areas, their frustrations. so i've sort of vicariously

lived their experience and their traumas as they have seen friend and colleagues, sort of evaporated in ied attacks and various other things. so, this is, this is my motivation for this. and you know, they sort of come to me and we talk about this in class. i teach a stability and reconstruction class from sort of historical perspective and you know, there are two questions. we did this in germany and japan after world war ii, why can't we do it now? why doesn't it work? why can't we do a marshall plan for afghanistan? so these are some of the yes, sir questions that have come up. and why if the british were so successful in places like

why can't we do this -- malaysia. this is sort of where i was coming from. and looking at this historically and challenging the historical record, how successful were they? i believe you spent a lot of time in malaya. why were the british successful? why did they win? when does one win insurgency? does one win with hearts and minds? so my book was an attempt to look how western democracyies fight of what caldwell called small wars. i concluded there are a lost sacrifices one has to make in this. that if you're going to be successful, you've either got to be extraordinarily brutal and therefore you pay a huge price in terms of civil military relations. and military professionalism. these small wars actually erode military professionalism in many respects because the insurgent is not regarded as a lawful combatant. and because he is not a lawful combatant or she, in this case they can be treated however.

we have hola, we have the battle algiers, we have my lai, and abu ghraib. we have atrocities are sown into the fabric of counterinsurgencies. that was where i was coming from. now what you have got to do to be successful in my opinion is to have the right political environment to succeed. >> dr. porch, sorry, is it possible to focus quite hard at moments on iraq and maybe we could expand on what your sense is of general petraeus's surge? >> general petraeus was fortunate in many respects. his timing was impeccable. al qaeda had overplayed its hand in anbar province. he, al qaeda had annoyed the tribes, many of them. so that when petraeus arrived

with the surge, some say that it was petraeus who imposed this. others, other interpretations it was actually the people on the ground who understood there was a, there was an opportunity here to sort of flip the tribes much the tribes were looking for a protector. so what in effect we did was a typical colonial tactic. you take the minorities and you arm the minorities, so they can protect themselves. and i'm sure, i imagined what the sunnis thought was that they were going to get protected like the kurds and so therefore we managed to flip them, temporarily. we see how ephemeral that tactical success was. as soon as, as soon as we walk out, then the whole situation deteriorates. >> why did it prove to be so ephemeral? >> well, because the government, because these people weren't detected. so the government attacks them, kills many tribal leaders who were loyal, armed by the united states. so, in essence what's been

happening is the failure of democracy in the middle east. i mean, since the beginning of the colonial state, the postcolonial state in the middle east, we had such faith and hopes for democracy and it just, the faux republics have disappeared. democracy building in iraq did not work. >> now we have people saying, fast forward to 2014, we have people saying what we need to do is we need to get people in to clear, hold and build the sunni areas of iraq. that could be anybody. sometimes people talk about the kurds. sometimes they talk about the iraqi army. sometimes they talk about our neighbors and sometimes talk about the international coalition doing it. general idea, go into isil-hold territory you clear and build. does this seem to be a strategy? >> that is grand at that time

tick and but it is not a strategy, right? what increasingly happened, sunni identity, has focused or become identified with anti-shism and in this case anti-earn westerners, specifically anti-americanism. who will be your local ally? at the will be a local thug, maybe, could can get some temporary advantage out of that. there will not be any great loyalty unless you we're going to sort of reconfigure the middle east. and create a sunni state in, what is it eastern syria and western iraq. that might be a possibility. but right now you know, the sunnis feel encircled and isil or isis, however you want to call it, is the most radical movement and they, they have taken the lead. they are the protectors. now some people think obviously sunnis, not all sunnis agree

with them, but right now i would argue they probably have legitimacy. >> before i hand off to my colleagues, there are people who say what we need to do is get boots on the ground and we need to go face-to-face with the enemy. does this seem like a sensible strategy? >> so what? what are you going to fight? they will start putting ied's everywhere. you will not have support from local population. what will happen, i can tell you, my students say, this language and culture, as soon as i lose two of my guys, i don't care about hearts and minds. it is people who are hiding these bad guys and we're going to take them out and we don't really care about that. boots on the ground will not get you anywhere. you have to build a viable political structure. war is politics. the problem with coin, its tactics in search of a strategy.

i don't see a strategy. international coalition is not a strategy. >> what will it achieve? what the coalition is doing at the moment? >> every time we intervened since jimmy carter in the 1980s we make the situation force. we create power vacuums, we alienate people and create ungoverned spaces. we're sort of living consequences in my opinion of the succession of policies. i think the trendlines for the middle east, for democracy in the middle east are dead. so you have to say, what are we trying to achieve there? what is going to be of the end state? are we going to rebuild syria? we couldn't rebuild iraq successfully in any case. we built it as a shia state in essence. so you got ruffle 20% of the population feels they don't have any stake in that country anymore. if we put boots on the ground, how is that going to be

perceived? well, we're there in support of assad, who is a shia and in support of iran in support of whoever replaces maliki. in other words we'll be there in the support of the shias. how much cooperation are we going to get from the local sunnis? i ask the question. i think very little again. i'm not an expert on this area but just seeing the trendlines i wouldn't think it was good. you will get a lot of people killed in my opinion, not just western soldiers but you will get a lost iraqis killed as well. sunnis killed as well. >> but currently the strategy is not to put boots on the ground. >> yeah. i don't -- we're going to bomb. what does bombing do? it creates collateral damage. radicalizes population further. it legitimizes isil, isis. it probably encourages foreign fighters to become involved

here. is what i imagine and radicalizes maybe indigenous populations, islamic populations. a some, a few in this country in the united states, in france, elsewhere. >> it's reached its extreme limit. it can't go north into turkey, it's not going to take baghdad because there's plenty of shia militias that are going to defend baghdad. it's not going to overthrow assad. so they're dead, right? where's it going to go? there is a sunni area that's got a few low grade oil wells. it makes a little bit of money, but i would say, you know, one of things you may want to think about is do nothing. >> i'm a little puzzled. one of the questions is there's a humanitarian catastrophe occurring across a large swath of the region that these people, isis, are, without question, pressing forward. they may not make baghdad, you're absolutely right, and kobani would be a bit of a disaster if they were to take it, and people are being persecuted for their beliefs and

there is a sunni area that's got a few low grade oil wells. it makes a little bit of money, but i would say, you know, one of things you may want to think about is do nothing. >> ok. it's jensen and jeffrey, sorry. >> i'm a little puzzled. one of the questions is there's a humanitarian catastrophe occurring across a large swath of the region that these people, isis, are, without question, pressing forward. they may not make baghdad, you're absolutely right, and kobani would be a bit of a disaster if they were to take it, and people are being persecuted for their beliefs and

their religion. are you really saying that as a civilized western nation we should basically do nothing at all and hope politics should sort it out? >> well, i think you should think about that as an option. i mean, there are a lot of places we're doing nothing. africa, for instance. >> do nothing -- one bad thing doesn't mean we do nothing for all bad things. >> well, but then what can you actually do there? what are you going to accomplish by intervening? >> i'm asking a question. >> you are asking a question, i think you're being a bit unfair in doing that. if, and i'm trying to go around, if you accept the premise that there are some wicked things occurring -- >> i agree with that. >> -- and seriously a complete basketcase, isis is doing, iraq's a basketcase, not even thinking about libya and elsewhere, there is a perfectly

legitimate quasi-pacifist argument that would say warfare achieves nothing, we can't see our boys being brought back in body bags, therefore, let's do nothing and hope the united nations and politics will sort it out. i'm paraphrasing your views disgracefully, but perhaps the argument if that's one which you're advancing, or are you simply saying -- i'm trying to get at what you are proposing. >> well, war is politics. you've got to have a viable political goal. i don't see a viable political goal. if you don't have a viable political goal, why would you throw british and american soldier into that situation that they can't accomplish anything? that's my point. i would never say war can accomplish nothing. i'm all for -- [inaudible] and these people, but i don't, you know, what's your goal? what's the center of gravity?

what do we take? that's going to change the dynamic of that situation? i mean, that's why i say you have to ask that question, what's the end state? because if you can't envision an end state, then why commit troops? >> jeffrey. >> doctor, the u.k. governments has hired a private company to train the peshmerga in bomb disposal, and in the past you've been critical of the use of private companies for such contracts. in the context of military establishment that is being downsized in many countries, what is your current view on the use of private companies in such a realm? >> well, i mean, it seems very -- [inaudible] and maybe using private companies to teach mine clearing is perfectly all right. the experience that the united

states had in iraq and afghanistan was fairly disastrous. these men were out of control in most cases. they were not subject to local laws. we had several atrocities that were committed by private contractors exercising what, you know, when i was in the u.s. army we called at the time of vietnam we called reconnaissance five-five, you start striving down the road -- driving down the road and start shooting to the sidessed -- sides and hope that would trigger the ambush. that's one problem. another problem is they cost a lot of money. a third problem is when they're trained up, when they train up indigenous soldiers, then they are siphoned off to do things like work for private contractors themselves. i mean, i know karzai at one point wanted to kick them out because between desertion and defection by private

contractors, the best police and soldiers that afghanistan had were basically defecting. so the army had to be rebuilt all the time because of this. so i don't think that's a good use of one's money. in my opinion. it has a bad track record. >> on this report very briefly, the don't intervene option, surely on your assumption that actually isil's expansionism is at an end. now, how can we be -- given the paucity of iraq's own army and the potential vulnerability of ball dad itself? >> well, of course, one can never be certain. but everybody treats isil like it's the -- [inaudible] it's not even the viet cong. these are guys running around in

pickup trucks, right? >> but we're beating -- the official army hands down. >> well, again, we haven't got to the subject yet, but one is security assistance. and i wrote an article about that and how, you know, the sort of failure of security assistance meaning training up indigenous armies, foreign legions and how this has not worked in modeling, it has not worked well in central africa, it didn't work in vietnam. the only place that it worked particularly well has been in colombia. and in the united states, there's this great search how do we take the colombian small footprint model and transition it to another place. now, i would argue just like the marshall plan or post-world war ii rebuilding of germany and japan, colombia succeeded in

contingent circumstances. i mean, we've been -- you don't have a clash of civilizations here, right? you've got a very catholic, christian country that has been cooperating with the united states since 1942, i believe, to protect the panama canal when we thought that was under attack by the japanese. they have a good military that was demoralized, they had a president, whatever you think about uribes' politics, he fired a lot of generals, and he got strategy, and he imposed a strategy on his military. that was ultimately very successful. now, are you going to have those conditions in these other countries? you're not going to get it in mali, you're not going to get it in libya, and so i think its folly to think that there is a model that you can transition from one area to another. again, i've got -- i had a number of my students who were

involved in security assistance in all of these places, and they said, well, you know, you don't really know what the local hierarchy is. i mean, just because the guy says he's a general doesn't mean that people are obeying him because you have all these sort of sub, you know, tribal hierarchies beneath it. and then they don't use equipment properly. and, basically, you're working -- and this gets back to the, to the question about contractors -- you really work on a very low tactical level. in militaries they really need to be reformed from the top down, and the approach is often to reform them from the bottom up. and this doesn't work well because, you know, tactical proficiency in the sort of operational vacuum leads to all sorts of problems, you know? one of the things i did at the naval postgraduate school was regional seminars for our foreign area officers, and these are officers that are defense attaches, assistants, they learn

languages and all that sort of thing. and i remember one of them said, a lieutenant colonel in an unnamed african country, said i just can't sleep at night because i know i'm training an army that's preying on its own people. >> thank you. dr. porch, we are talking here of the consequence of the illegal force invading iraq, and we're having to deal with those consequences. and -- [inaudible] two christian gentlemen, apparently. and i wonder if we could just -- could i just ask, you in biblical terms are suggesting we should walk by on the other side whereas i would ask you should we not be the good samaritan to all these people who are in danger, as we speak, of being obliterated? >> ok. why are we in the middle east?

what is the national interest of britain and the united states to be in the middle east? well, initially, it's to spread democracy, right? this is what we were going to do when we invaded iraq. that hasn't worked. now the mantra is that, well, we have to protect its energy security. well, energy security environment has changed radically now, and we have to sort of ask ourselves do we really need the middle east anymore? i mean, what purpose does it serve? now we're fracking, now with natural gas, with all these other sources of energy, maybe the middle east is not that important? maybe we can sort of walk away from it? if we do that, then we have to

say, all right, then what do we have to prepare for? one of the things we have to prepare for in the short term are disruptions of energy supplies until we get our fracks or whatever else we -- fracking or whatever else we want to do, prepare for humanitarian relief because there's already been lots of bad stuff that's happened. so, you know, prepare for that. and that, it seems to me, would be, would be one of the things we could do from the christian perspective or the humanitarian perspective. and then work politically with allies in the region to try to stabilize the place. maybe through turkey, but turkey, i noticed they let the peshmerga through today to defend the town in the north, kobani, whatever it's called. but, i mean, there's so many agendas in the middle east.

the sunni/shia one is only one. you've got the gulf states have their own agendas, turkey is going to demand a huge price. it's, and all of these things are going to change. they can flip overnight. so how do you even plan a political advantage? and you put your soldiers in the middle of that? >> do we have a moral obligation? >> i think we have -- again, i'm speaking personally -- i think we have a moral obligation to do what we can do. i don't think we have a moral obligation to do what, to accomplish what we cannot accomplish. i think we have a moral obligation to our p own people and our own soldiers first, and i think there's a strong moral argument to say don't put them in a situation in which they will get killed or they will have to commit atrocities.

because all of this is going to come home, right? it's going to come home in the periphery, the -- you're going to have military atrocities, degradations of -- [inaudible] degradation of military professionalism, you're going to have to strengthen the surveillance state, you're going to have mill tarrization of the police. this is what you're going to have if you do this. >> coming home, of course, from a british perspective is estimated there are 500 british citizens who are, should be charged with treason who are currently fighting in what is called -- i don't really want to give it the title, the islamic state in iraq. which i think gives it a status which it doesn't warrant because they are terrorists. but that's -- they are there fighting against british interests, arguably. and, of course, if this continues, they may wish to come home, be in the united kingdom. where just possibly they might wish to continue their terrorism and atrocities in mainland

britain. so don't you think britain has a -- >> all i'm saying -- >> -- has a role to play? >> all i'm saying is that you risk swelling the numbers of those people if you intervene. that would be my suggestion. >> can i just, you did mention turkey. that's a particular area i'd like to pursue, if i may. to what extent will turkey's support or perhaps more accurately lack of support impact on the capacity to degrade and destroy the terrorist forces? >> well, again, you've got me out of my depth here. i am certainly no turkish expert, and i have no insight into erdogan's mind. but we know he hates assad. and if we're going to intervene in syria, presumably it's to reinforce some sort of shia-assad regime.

and so that's going to be one way we'll have difference of opinion. obviously, you are the can key can provide bases disturb you are the can key can provide bases -- obviously, turkey can provide bases, one of my questions was what exactly were you guys thinking of lawrence of arabia to dismantle the ottoman empire? we're almost getting nostalgic for this. he's got a lot of leverage on us, and what will he demand in return for his cooperation? that's my question. >> dr. porch, you've made it clear that, at least if i understand you right, that the u.k. should not join the u.s. and the american allies in carrying out airstrike in syria. >> i understand there are domestic political pressures to do something and that, you know, i mean, you all are politicians. politicians have to make compromises, and they have to make, you know, political choices; political choices in the short term and in the long

term. i can understand there are pressures to do something. and bombing is the easy thing to do, or drones is the easy thing to do. but it's hubristicn my point of view. >> my last question, dr. porch, is it has been suggested that if the terrorist group isil is depleted, that they would be replaced by something worse, although i don't know what could with be worse. and if so, what should be the international coalition's strategy? and is it flexible enough to take on a new threat should the terrorists in their current form be defeated? >> well, al-qaeda emerges in whatever form. isil is the latest one. wherever a rebellion against a shia regime. they're always going to appear. you've always also got to realize that the middle east is one of the most wired regions in the world. i mean, there's no al-jazeera for latin america, for instance. but al-jazeera, in way, has

played the role of unifying islamic, i would say, public opinion, certainly arab public opinion from morocco to the far east. and any of these rebellions are presented as justified popular uprisings. and they're going to get support all over the region. >> that's interesting. thank you very much. >> briefly. >> at the risk from possible -- [inaudible] what you did mention was -- [inaudible] don't you think it's a legitimate reason to take action against isil to prevent -- [inaudible] >> well, there is a difference of opinion about what threat that poses to homeland, both

yours and mine. one argument would be that the threat is inflated, that intelligence organizations now have a vested interest in -- [inaudible] now, the threat could certainly be there. i'm just saying that is one of the arguments. on the other hand, i think we have intelligence services in both of our countries that are pretty proficient, i would argue, in tracking this down. now, and that if you intervene, you're actually going to have more threats, not less. that would be my answer.

>> before we let you go, return to the -- [inaudible] the basic model on how to deal with the predecessor -- [inaudible] which was al-qaeda in iraq go in, clear, surge, hold, build. the position that's now being proposed seems to be, from your precedent, that you contain isil and you somehow create the space or the time for the iraqi state to get in there and clear, hold, build and create these effective, legitimate, credible state structures, and the iraqi army gets into most of them, gets into anbar and somehow turns the situation around. how can i characterize that properly, and what would be your analysis of that theory? >> i would think that's the best case scenario. do i think that's going to happen? no. we've already seen how the shia

regime handles things. other thing is like in afghanistan, you're going to have a safe harbor across the border in syria, whatever you want to call it. it's just like the taliban in pakistan, you can't get at them. they're going to continue to stable aize. and then what are you going to do, are you going to be like the french in algeria where you invade tunisia because you've got the fln across the border? i mean, it just expands. it doesn't stop. that's the trouble. these things keep escalating. >> thank you, dr. porch. brief point before our next witness -- >> committee is fortunate to

have, again, general -- [inaudible] who's most recently served as the allied commander but as otherwise had a very distinguished career in which he has in kosovo, in iraq, indeed, in -- [inaudible] combat british military and is with us today to provide a perspective of a very, very recently retired general. when did you formally leave the military? >> formally left on the 7th of august. >> very recently, in fact. i'm going to hand it to my colleague, derek -- [inaudible] >> i just ask, you've been critical of the government's strategy. i'd like to sort of put a question to you in two parts. do you -- are you -- would you

be confident that the current trajectory of the military is clear and confident about what the government's strategy is in iraq on isil? i mean, answering that question, do you believe that actually whatever that may be, that that could be attained by airstrikes alone? >> i can't answer for the current everybodying military as to whether -- serving military as to whether they are clear or not. >> i'm asking you what you think. >> if you're asking me whether i think this is a credible and sensible strategy which is going to achieve a policy, i think i'd start by looking to define the

policy -- >> yes. >> i think we have seen at least on two occasions in sunday papers articles written by both the prime minister and the foreign secretary highlighting a threat that isil causes in fatherly apocalyptic terms and -- fairly apocalyptic terms and excising them from the face of the earth or words to that effect, i paraphrase that. now, if that is the case and that is the government policy, then i don't think that the strategy, such as it is, is going to achieve that. >> why not? >> because i think it's -- our strategy is about integrating ends, ways and means in the pursuit of policy, and i quote from the pamphlet on strategy. the policy needs to be clearer, the ends need to be clarified, and the problem needs to be scoped. you then need to determine how you are going to resolve the

problem, and then you need to allocate means to achieve that. and that means putting your money where your mouth is, in a sense. and what we've seen, i'm afraid, from the government is the degree of what i've described as gesture strategy. a lot of noise about the nature of the problem, but actually precious little in terms of resolving the problem. because if you go back, to example, to the protection of the yazidis back in august, what did we see? a lot of noise about protecting yazidis, deployment of two c-130s to drop relief supplies. well, you don't protect people by dropping relief op top of them, and the results of that are plain to see. >> i said -- [inaudible] be the military command taking decisions, but i'm trying to push you a little further

because i think you partly answered it. you've said what the government, prime minister and foreign secretary have said, but do you see a strategy? i'm trying to pin you down to be a little bit more succinct. >> well, as i think i said, i mean, a strategy -- >> you said objectives for strategies. >> well, i don't see a strategy. >> right. >> because a strategy requires the application of not just military force, your previous interviewee, dr. porch, stressed the importance of politics. i absolutely sanction that. but it's about political, diplomatic, economic, humanitarian as well as military in order to achieve the aims of policy, and i don't think we see that. >> on what -- [inaudible] put the military in terms of trying

to do their job? >> well, if you, if you ask the military to take the lead in a political vacuum, you're asking for problems because there is no such thing as a purely military solution. and you can't expect the military to apply force without the other levers of power being applied at the same time. so if that is your strategy, it's going to fail. >> now, a number of distinguished of our armed forces have said, you know, this will not work without ground forces. would you like to comment on that? >> yes -- >> public strategy in the first place. >> if you have, if you have a threat and if you take the threat posed by isil which is potentially looking at defeating and undermining a state in the middle east, iraq, given the collapse of the iraqi armed forces back in june and, frankly, they don't seem to have

got withen much better -- gotten much better since then, the only way you're going to stop that if that's what you're going to do -- in other words, your policy -- is to apply military force. and if you're serious about it, you've got to be prepared to apply all the levers of military power from the air, if necessary, from the sea and, in necessary, on the ground. and i would have thought that if you're serious about dealing with eye -- isil, your first step is to try and do what you can to build up the capability of regional powers to deal with it themselves. because we all know the challenges of getting engaged in the middle east. but with it may be you don't have time to do that. it may be that your national interests say that you've got to stop them earlier, you don't have the time to build up a regional capacity, so you might have to deploy force yourself. but i think the capacity building point is the keyish hue to be looking at. and you don't build capacity in armies unless you are prepared to get on the ground and do it alongside. and i think the afghanistan example is a very good example

of where capacity has been built up in line with strategy, it's been built from the bottom up, and i think it's a great credit, actually, that isaf by the end of the mission at the end of this year will be able to say, nato will be able to say that it has built a capable and adequately capable afghanistan defense force. but that's required significant cost, significant expenditure and significant expense of both blood and treasure. and that's what it takes. you can't just do, you can't stand up, expect private security companies to do a little bit of ead training and call that capacity building. >> following on that very important point you just made, what went wrong with the iraqi armed forces then? >> well, i repeat -- >> and were you surprised? >> well, i mean, i saw one, one specific area. in my view, and i think i've certainly said this to the inquiry and it was certainly in my report, i think we adopted a hands-off approach to training

the iraqi army. i think we adopted an approach that was excessively risk averse. we did not build up a relationship of trust. we did not train alongside, live alongside and, if necessary, fight alongside the iraqi. we stood off at a divisional level and expected them to do it. and be, certainly, the results were plain to see when the iraqis, some iraqi formations were put into the fight in baghdad in 2006. that said, i think the americans did a much better job because they were prepared to engage and get stuck alongside the iraqi army on the ground and did extremely well. roll forward a bit into my last experience of working alongside the iraqis was deputy --

[inaudible] when the very small nato training mission working alongside the americans back this 2010, 2011 was actually achieving a significant effect in professionalizing the iraqi army through training in officer cadet schools, staff colleges, mentoring senior officers. >> what's your view about the fighting capability of isil? because dr. porch suggested that it was sort of a group of, groups of fighters which wasn't really an army and really, you know, do we want to be spending a ground force in against them and stirring up a hornet's nest? >> well, i don't -- i haven't seen the intelligence assessments of isil, and i know about as much as -- but the key point here is isil only needs to be were one bullet better than its enemy, and it's clearly one billion better than the iraqis.

now, the fact you have a jihadist movement which has managed to equip itself with the means and capabilities of a national army through equipment captured from the iraqi army, so it's got tanks, it's got or armored vehicles -- it's got armored vehicles, it's got guns and, therefore, you need the capabilities to deal with those. now, i'm sure in terms of professionalism, procedures, the like, it would be absolutely no match for a well equipped western army. but the fact is it's probably going to be better than the iraqi army it's up against. >> [inaudible] >> general, if i understood your thesis correctly, mainly that if the policy was laid out as far as to remove the cancer of isil and requiring the strategy of limited airstrikes against iraq would not achieve it. and in order to achieve that policy, the strategy would have to be very much more extensive use of the military levers -- [inaudible] as you describe. that's quite a sense bl thesis. politically, of course, the latter is extraordinarily

unlikely. there will not be an all-out war against isil with british forces there. given that's the case, what should the policy be? >> well, you need to ask the policymakers that. i'm not here as a policymaker, i'm here as an ex-professional soldier, and my military recommendation is if you want to destroy isil, you go do it properly. >> ok. i say, of course, we can't do that -- >> that's a political judgment. >> of course it's a political judgment, but there's an apex between policies and, i mean, you know, the previous witness, broadly speaking, i think i'm not misquoting him, and you were in the room at the time, i think -- [inaudible] i think given the reality of politics, namely we can't have all-out war in iraq or syria involving british, american troops at this stage at least, are you not advocating broadly the same thing? namely because we can't do that,

the current -- [inaudible] use of limited airstrikes in iraq are pointless and, therefore, we should do nothing? >> no. i think at the very least we should do whatever possible to build up capability with the iraqi army and whatever anti-assad forces in syria that we deem might be suitable to be built up into a force capable of taking on isil. >> [inaudible] >> general, you sort of answered the second sort of part of question i was just about to ask which is if we are going to train people to do things, and whether that means instructing them and putting them in jordan or whatever we do or whether we do stuff in country or whether we don't, trying to help them gairntion regain the capacity or gain the capacity in the first place is one of the things that's going to be attempted. the iraqi army, your point, absolutely 2010-'11, there was a lot of money trying to assist the iraqis in training their army, but interestingly enough,

that was about weapons systems. it was done by contract and selling arms, all the rest of it. so the point about contractors coming in and or the of like aid in the iraqi state by their choice to train their army, they were training them in weapons systems but a component whereby they'd stand and fight for their country, their allegiance has been somewhere else. so what do you think we should build into this training program? i would say we start with noncommissioned officers. that's what i would say. what would you say? >> well, i think you build, you build everything that an army needs into a training program. >> but do you start with the officers and -- >> i think you, i think you clearly, i mean, you start with the individual, both soldier, nco and officer, you build up the capability of the team whether suction, platoon, company and battalion. you insure they have the

capabilities in terms of weapons systems. you insure they know how to use the weapons systems as individuals and collectively as teams. you insure they have the start systems in order to be able to deploy those capabilities and the supply chains in order to insure that the logistics is there for them to do that. >> leadership and intent? >> and leadership. leadership training is absolutely integral, of course, to the building up of the individual officer and nco. >> and started that rather than teaching them to shoot the gun, because it seems like a lot of them know how to pull the trigger. it's unique, it's wail -- >> you've got to start with the foundations, and the foundations are individual basic training whether soldier, officer or nco. >> you remain surprisingly optimistic about training the iraqi army. but it might be possible to say

that this was tried. i mean, we saw this. the staff you're talking about, the u.s. army, put a lot of effort and a lot of money into it. when i went to see them in baghdad in 2008-2009, they were living alongside the iraqi army, very proud of doing that. all the way from the private soldier all the way up to the officer level. and what have we ended up with? we've ended up with this incredibly corrupt, shia-dominated, iranian-dominated army. and now you're essentially proposing that we return to try to do the same thing, but presumably this time with less resources than we had before, without the american soldiers embedded at every level. why should -- [inaudible] isn't this suggesting something that a's completely impossible?

>> i think you highlight one essential point is it's not a sectarian force in which one section is able odom nate over the others. and, arguably, in 2008 this was a relatively sectarian-free armed force. and since then, of course, you've seen the shias being -- the sunni being alienated and the predominance of the shia -- [inaudible] >> but isn't the problem then, general, if it was sectarian-free force in 2008 but within six years the whole thing collapses and becomes a sectarian force again because of the politics, because of iran, because of the government, it looks like that's what we achieved, a temporary stopgap. we train them um, we walk -- them up we walk away, and in six years we're back to square one. >> well, yeah. i would think, certainly, by 2011 when we were renegotiating with the iraqi government, the mandate of the nato training mission, that this was not an entirely unprofessional organization. and as a result, particularly -- and i think what you say with that nato training mission which was only about 150 people, the focus on officer training in the academies, in staff colleges and a higher staff level of training was definitely, without

question, improving the professionalism of the iraqi army. and through that it was providing a stabilizing force in the iraqi state. of course, 2011 the discuss of forces agreement is not, is not signed, nato has to pull its training mission out very quickly and, actually, it's worth mentioning, i had -- i met the iraqi defense minister in about april of that year. they recognized how valuable the nato training mission was. the iraqi government was keen to maintain it and, indeed, was prepared to part fund it as well

because they recognized how valuable it was. and, of course, you then see the end of that at the end of 2011. and i think from that, from then on you get increasing shia domination, you get the impact of the syrian civil war, the rise of al-qaeda in iraq or aka isis, and then i think whole thing begins to implode. but i stick by what i say. you don't can necessarily -- the idea was we're going to do it properly. but nevertheless, you can achieve quite an impact at a higher level with a relatively small focused professional mission along the lines of the nato training mission. >> can i just ask you a bit of a geeky question, really. police forces, the other part of the security element, to you see that as all part of the same training, or do you see a separate set of arrangements for that? how do you see that because of the experience we've had in afghanistan, i want to know what you have to say about that. >> i think it is very much part

of the same set. and, actually, again, the nato training mission is a good example. as well as training the officers as i just described at different officer levels and cadet schools, being a multi-national nato force, it had a significant contingent from italy who did a superb job in training the iraqi police and the iraqi oil mis. and -- oil police. they had a very good scheme of doing that. and this highlights the value of a multi-national force where you can bring in different disciplines to focus on the police as well. and, indeed, afghanistan is similar because the training mission consisted not only of the afghan army, but afghan national police and afghan civil police. >> so it's not an army, it's a security force. >> it's a security force, yeah. >> general, do you think the u.k.'s current force structures are optimal in terms of our capacity to respond to a crisis such as that in the middle east at the moment? >> no. >> and in saying no, which is very, very clear -- [laughter] i mean, what do you think needs to change? and especially in terms of not

just the middle east, but the potential situation in eastern europe as well? >> well, i think what we have seen with army 2020 the is a hollowing out of the force structure. i think that, i think the army's done as good a job as it can do with a very difficult set of cards to play. but i think that reducing the army by 20,000, expecting the army reserve to be able to fill the gap, i think what we see is a very hollowed-out force structure. and although on paper the army is meant to be capable of deploying up to a division, i think the reality is that whatever is behind the shop

window in term of sustainability and logistics would be pretty wafer thin. so i think the chances are that it would not be able to do its job. >> so if in addition to our current commitment in the middle east and our declining commitment in afghanistan we had to deploy troops with nato and in eastern europe, are you saying that it's difficult to see how that could happen successfully under the current structures? >> i think it is, yeah. >> you saying that, essentially, what we're sending is what we can send rather than what we might like to send or what we need to send? >> no, i'm not. because i think we could send a lot more than six tornadoes. >> what could we send? >> you'd have to ask the chief of the general staff the details. >> you're becoming a politician. >> the army 2020 structure, according to the rubric, you'd be able to -- you should be able

to send up to a division, if necessary. now, i think if you looked in detail at that, you would find that extremely difficult to do. and if you remember, i mean, go back to the first gulf war in 991, a division of two army by braids and a -- [inaudible] -- by divide, and the -- [inaudible] the result was that that was a force which the american core commander at the time, general freddie frank, described its ability to advance across the desert was relentless because it was so well logistically provisioned which is what you need. i don't think we can begin to match that. >> general, in terms of the current crisis in the middle east, do you think that's likely to have an impact in terms of the isaf withdrawal from afghanistan and how that is managed post-withdrawal? and are there lessons from iraq, for example, that can be applied in relation to the withdrawal from afghanistan, or is it too late for that? >> well, a lot of questions there.

i think, firstly, the impact on drawdown in afghanistan of isaf, of course, the isaf mission finishes in just over two months' time. effectively, certainly as i left the shape of planning was really by the end of october the force level in afghanistan would be pretty much the same as the post-isaf train, advise, assist mission which we were planning at that time of round about 12,000. so i think what you would have seen anyway by now is the majority of isaf will have drawn down, and you'll see pretty much a flatline now through into the training, advise, assist mission when the isaf flag is drawn down at end of december. so i don't think it will have a major impact on train, advise, assist mission in afghanistan. that was one question. remind me of the others. ? and what do you think the