would have predicted in, say 1955 or 1995? is the left nuclear eyes world a product of the 1968 nuclear nonproliferation treaty? remember the 1960's, people predicted 20, 30, 40 nuclear weapons states by the start of the 21st century. is this low number or relatively low number because of an emerging norm even taboo against these seven possession of nuclear weapons? is it because of the demand of being open politically liberal capitalistic state, conflict with the goals of acquiring nuclear weapons as a scholar has claimed? or has it been american nuclear nonproliferation efforts everything from norms to treaties to threats to sanctions to even considering preventative military strikes to sprawling alliances and security agreements around the world? has that been the key factor keeping the number of nuclear weapons states in the single digits? again, we do not know. we cannot be sure.

but there are lots of arguments. the one interesting surprise that we point out in the historical record is that the united states went to great lengths, greater lengths than we perhaps realized in the past, to keep its friends and allies nonnuclear van it'd even its enemies. countries ranging from west germany to japan to south korea and australia, italy and sweden, the list goes on and on. in fact, issued a willingness to work with its adversary, the soviet union, against its allies to accomplish it. the third important question is an age old one -- how much is enough? in other words, what are the fourth and strategy requirements for nuclear deterrence? and are they different than the requirement for assuring allies? can a state achieve meaningful nuclear superiority, and if so, what are the benefits of achieving such privacy? this is a comics question, but during the cold war, there were

two leading views. many of the academic and think tank analyst, renowned thinkers like bernard brodie, can waltz believe that once the state possessed survivable nuclear forces professed -- possessed enough nuclear weapons that even an attack upon them allow them to unleash damage on the enemy and once you achieve that state, there was really no point in building more forces spirit strategic stability was then achieved. building more, larger, or more aggregate strategic nuclear forces or spending money on things like missile defense was a waste -- a way to potentially destabilize. many americans do not accept this logic and the u.s. continued, even after mutual vulnerable he was achieved, seemingly enshrined in the 1972 strategic arms limitation treaty and anti-ballistic missile treaty to seek faster, more accurate,'s healthier nuclear

forces be in multibillion-dollar programs like the peacekeeper, the b1 and b2, cruise missiles missile defense, and massive investments in anti-summer in warfare, all systems oriented toward counterforce, and if one follows the logic of such systems, potential first use revealed the united states sought nuclear superiority. what do they think they were getting for this massive investment, for these systems that arguably, at least according to some analysts, undermine strategic stability? and did they get what they sought? there is, by the way, a limited but quite revealing bit of evidence that the soviet side understood that the americans were trying to acquire many. the right he in the 1970's and 1980's, based upon capabilities that russian neither had the technology, nor the economic resources to match, and it worried them quite a bit.

it is an interesting contrast to what appears to be a much different attitude in china today, where despite an increasingly vigorous form policy and military expansion, based upon an impressive economic and technological base, the people's republic of china seems relatively sanguine about being on the short end of a nuclear balance of the united states. answering these three questions would go a long way toward helping us navigate the nuclear choices we have in front of us that josh so eloquently laid out. i wish i could provide you with concrete answers to these and other important puzzles, but historians traffic in uncertainty and context, and they are far better at asking hard questions and throwing cold water on those that would provide easy answers, which is probably why do not get invited to more terrific events like this. [laughter] it is hard to get excited by his bigger whose conclusions are, it is complicated, it all depends, or we cannot really know. that said, i do look forward to discussing these and any other west and you have an hearing

from my distinguished fellow panelists. thank you very much. [applause] gen. kehler: if i stop talking in the middle of a sentence, it is because i'm going paperless tonight. my screen has gone blank so give me a moment. [laughter] let me see if i can make this do something it was supposed to do. there we go. thank heaven i can say something , now. thanks for inviting me to the tower center. this is a big honor for me. i will tell you i always enjoy , coming to panel discussions like this, particularly when the audience is filled with a mixture of people like tonight. including a fair number of undergraduates. i think that -- i am very gratified to see so many undergraduates because i think these issues in particular, well

-- while they used to get discussed in many places through the cold war, at the end there was a tendency to not talk about these issues. the conversations we have now are long overdue. it is the first time i have visited smu. i must say it is a very , beautiful campus. i walked around today. how lovely it is. i wish i could spend more time here. i promise i will come back at some point and walk around and get to see some of the things you guys have told me about. they sound so delightful. i am also pleased to be on stage with professor gavin. i'm fascinated by his review of the u.s. arsenal and the questions that he posed and the puzzles that he talked about are spot on. they are very interesting conversations and very necessary conversations. i might yield a little bit of a bucket of cold water myself in just a moment because i will speak with what sounds like a little bit more certainty, but i

will say i think he raises fair points about how certain we can be about some of our tried and true assumptions related to nuclear weapons and deterrents. i think that is a great set of subjects for many of you undergraduates to study. as you heard in the introduction, i served for almost 39 years in uniform. much associated with the strategic forces, so the opinions you would hear from me are mine and they will have a decidedly military flavor to them. as you heard, i will take a minute, and i am going to piggyback on what professor gavin said. i think his points bear repeating. let me do it with a little bit of my own military slant. no question about it -- nuclear weapons have occupied a unique place in global affairs since august of 1945. i would assert while nuclear weapons were conceived to win a war, shortly after their use

they became a critical tool to prevent a war. in my humble view, that was thereir great value and remains that value today. we can debate how certain we can be that is what had happened but i think there is some evidence that would suggest that, in fact, nuclear weapons have been war preventing weapons. why? obviously, nuclear weapons are unprecedented with their potential to inflict enormous destruction over a very short time with long-term physical and psychological effects that could be global in scope. nuclear weapons were woven into the fabric of our national security strategy as the ultimate guarantor of our security and our allies. nuclear superiority became an affordable means to compensate for conventional inferiority for the united states and its allies in during the cold war, if you recall. many of you don't. but if you do recall -- more on

that later by the weight that i will show my age. but if you ever read anything about the cold war, there was a large conventional inferiority on the part of nato vis-à-vis the warsaw pact. there was a tremendous advantage in terms of ground forces, in particular. deterrence was the objective of -- behind having nuclear weapons. the policies, strategies and employment plans were designed to convince adversaries and they would not achieve their goals by attacking us. that is the benefit of deterrence. or they would pay too high of a price. that is the imposed cost part of deterrence. nuclear deterrence fit with the cold war strategy of containment. to be sure, nuclear weapons the not eliminate all conflicts or will they ever, but the threat of nuclear war imposed limits, compelled caution and forced leaders to stop and ponder the consequences of escalation

before they acted. i think the evidence of this is clear in korea, berlin, vietnam, cuba, the middle east and , elsewhere. the notion of war between the major powers change in august of 1945. and while i do not believe we have entered a long period of pe ace, certainly, the world has not seen a hot war between major powers since august of 1945. it would be speculation for sure , and i completely agree with professor gavin on that it is point. speculation to say because of nuclear weapons, but i look prior to 1945 when conventional deterrence was attempted by the great powers, whether that was the great white fleet, battleship building, whatever the form it took, never lasted. the world found itself in large global conflicts that were increasingly violent and deadly

as time passed. but i would argue from my perspective nuclear deterrence , worked. but there are some interesting questions about that, and today people would say well ok, it , worked then, that was then. the conditions no longer exist today. nuclear deterrence, therefore, the weapons create more risk , than benefit to our national security. i don't think that is true. let me take a couple of minutes to explain why i think that is true. for those of us that served in the cold war, it does not seem like very much time has passed. yet, an entire generation of men and women have served in the u.s. armed forces since the cold war ended. some have completed an entire 20 -year career. actually, 24 years if you count 1991 as the end of the cold war. for the last 10 to 15 years or so while i was still on active duty, i would occasionally use a

cold war example to describe something to the younger troops. i would get a blank stare in return. an army friend of mine is part of this recent return some u.s. ground forces the europe as a -- to europe as a demonstration of the fact we could reinforce nato if we had to. there were famous examples of that during the cold war -- they were called reforger exercises. that was in acronym for return of forces to germany. this friend of mine, a collie, a general officer, said he was talking to his troops just like reforger. they looked at him like, grandpa -- i do not know what that means. so the cold war has been over for a long time. i believe we know it. today's men and women often use weapons designed and built during the cold war, but their experiences shaped by iraq and afghanistan and libya and kosovo

and the global war against violent extremists, not a face-off over an iron curtain in central europe and the threat of a large-scale nuclear war. for me, the war ended in september of 1991. i was in command of an icbm unit on the day that president george h.w. bush ordered all of our nuclear bombers and their supporting tankers and half of our intercontinental ballistic missiles off of cold war alert status. in short order, he implemented other nuclear initiatives that have dramatic effects on u.s. posture and stockpile as well. yes, we still retained a nuclear deterrent force, ballistic missile summaries and intercontinental ballistic missiles on alert. but for those of us on the field the cold war was over. while we had hoped for long periods of peace dividend, the 21st century has brought new challenges. today's strategic threats are more complex than the

singular existential threat posed by the soviet union in the 20th century. today's threat include hybrid combinations of strategy tactics and capabilities. , they included nuclear weapons, cyber weapons, long-range ballistic missiles, traditional conventional and nonconventional weapons that can be wielded by state and nonstate actors alike. uncertainty and complexity dominate the global security landscape today. violent extremism is the most likely threat the u.s. faces. with the marriage of such extremists and a nuclear weapon, the most dire threat of all. but that is not the only threat we face. adversaries and potential adversaries continue to pursue capabilities, conduct strategic attacks against the u.s. and the allies as a main component of their security strategies. such attacks are defined by their affect and not the weapon used. it could involve nuclear or

conventional kinetic or non-kinetic weapons. such strategic attacks could arrive at our doorsteps through space or cyberspace or even in a non-traditional way. i would argue the attacks of 9/11 were strategic attacks on the united states. while the likelihood of a massive nuclear attack on the u.s. has receded thankfully, russia, china and north korea all have the capability to inflict terrible casualties and damage on the u.s. and our allies over the course of several hours with nuclear weapons. russia and china are pursuing aggressive modernization. both have included nuclear weapons in their new strategic doctor and. -- dr. anoctrine. senior russian leaders have recently restated their commitment to their own nuclear deterrence. i have been a bit surprised by the amount of nuclear saber rattling the russians have been doing. nuclear weapons formed the basis

of deterrence in india and pakistan. north korea openly advertises its possession of nuclear weapons and works on ballistic missiles that will deliver them against the regional allies and the united states itself and overtly threatened to use them , as they most famously did back in 2013. as you see in the press, negotiations continue with iran and the outcome remains to be , seen. others to include some of our allies and partners, looking at acquiring nuclear weapons depending on the behavior of their neighbors. there is a simple reason why many of our adversaries and potential adversaries see nuclear weapons as essential to their security. after watching the u.s. project power around the globe for the past 20 years, these and other potential adversaries are looking to compel the u.s. to restrain its action or in a crisis or conflict, to restrict our options and intimidate our allies and coalition partners through the threat of escalation, possibly to nuclear use. it is the cold war in reverse. other threatening nuclear use

to compensate for u.s. convention superiority. in short i don't see a world , without nuclear weapons on the horizon anytime soon, something president obama acknowledged. that was when he gave his prod speech. -- he gave his prague speech. while strategic attack the 21st century could take many forms, a nuclear attack on the u.s. or our allies remains absolutely the worst case scenario. therefore, deterring strategic attack, including nuclear attack, must remain the number one priority for the department of defense. 21st century deterrence concepts still sound familiar. like they did in the cold war -- deny benefits and impose costs to credible forces and a range of options for the president to use as needed in a conflict. the commitment to insure our -- ensure our allies and partners by extending our umbrella to them. how they apply those concerts in

-- concepts in the 21st century is very different. 21st century deterrence must be tailored to a wide variety of actors and scenarios. one size can no longer fit all. 21st century deterrence demands the flexible application of the full range of complementary military capability. strong conventional forces forward presence, missile defenses cyberspace , capabilities, effective command and control and the ultimate possibility of a u.s. nuclear response in extreme circumstances for vital national interests. we no longer have to threaten nuclear use to compensate for conventional inferiority, but no combination of conventional, kinetic, or cyber capabilities can hold of that risk. the full range of assets and enemy values the most. no combination with the same risks of long-term and short-term effects of nuclear weapons. in a future conflict, nuclear options will provide the

president with the ability to hold the enemy's most critical assets at risk, compel the enemy to consider the consequences of his actions in ways no conventional weapon can do, and prevent the enemy from escalating by threatening us with nuclear attack. our allies and partners will continue to rely on the security guarantees our nuclear forces provide as well. , from my point of view, absent some unforeseen change or until a suitable replacement comes along, nuclear weapons will contribute to our national security and the security of our allies for quite some time and they will do that by providing the president with options. underwriting our freedom of action and compelling caution on the adversary. they may be fewer in numbers they certainly need to be focused on our highest end strategic and deterrence needs. they need to be woven into a doctrine that contemplates their use in extreme circumstances where our vital national

security interests are at stake. they must be seen as a complementary tool in an expanded kit of options that include conventional and non-kinetic weapons. they must be under the strictest possible control of the president of the united states. they must be modern and sustainable. that leads us to my final point. here is the dilemma. i used to get asked this question while testifying on the hill, and i would say we happened to be in the worst place at a bad time. we find ourselves in need of modernization of our nuclear arsenal at the very time budgets are declining. so here we have weapons that still, in my humble view, play a vital role in our national security. others are modernizing their arsenals. our deterrent to include the stockpile of delivery systems and communication systems has reached a critical point in sustainment and modernization. many of the weapons and other

industrial-based things that we have today were really acquired during the reagan defense buildup and are over 30 years old. the newest b-52's were built in the 1960's. i flew in a tanker some years ago. two youngsters, two captains in the front. they were youngsters compared to everybody else on the airplane. i said to them -- we were doing that thing that generals do. middle of the night, and we were flying somewhere over the world and it was quiet and cold. i went forward into the cockpit to caht hat them up. i was chatting them up and they were doing what young crew members do -- pretending like they were interested. [laughter] i asked one of them -- when did you come to active duty -- to make a long story short, the airplane we were flying in was made long before he was born.

i didn't feel -- it didn't bother me a whole lot. other than to say you get the -- other than to say, you get the some point where the system has to be modernized and upgraded and we are there. i think it was really well -outlined in 2010 where it was clear about our need to sustain and modernize our deterrent systems, including the weapons and delivery platforms and command and control support. it said we should retain the triad of nuclear forces. i'm happy to talk about that in the questions and answers. we should maintain a modern infrastructure and maintain a highly capable workforce. some of you need to become a part of that workforce whether you are working on policies or public policies associated with it or the engineering -- we need you. we need to pursue a viable hedge strategy that reduces the overall number of weapons while ensuring that the reliability of the individual weapons are high.

clarity, consensus, and visual commitment are needed from the top-down and all need to be aligned with the relevance and assurance of 21st century concepts. so, let me say in conclusion, i think our nuclear deterrent has served us very well since august of 1945 and i think it will continue to play a vital role in our national security for a long time. thank you again for inviting me and a look forward to your questions. thank you. [applause] >> thank you very much, general. we will do the q&a. i will do the privilege of asking the first question. i think we have a microphone going around. i would like to ask a question to both of you. first, professor gavin -- you make a plea for humility. it is a hard question to answer.

but we have a room full of people who want to know more. so how do you approach this subject? you do this for a living. you studied this issue deeply. you write books about it. how do you start to answer what is essentially an unanswerable question? for general kehler, i was taken with your description of the changes from the cold war and the present security environment. as you said, the world has seemed to become more complex, a greater variety of threats and instruments. but you also said u.s. nuclear weapons would only be used in extreme circumstances against military-style targets when they are a vital national security interest that is at stake. that suggests to me that nuclear weapons are still reserved for great powers who can do the united states grave danger. if i am right and the conditions for use are that narrowly

constrained, then why don't we look for the cold war for lessons, rather than trying to craft new strategies of deterrence? prof gavin: that is a terrific question. i certainly -- humility should not necessarily discourage somebody from curiosity. that is the first thing i say to all my students. my attitude towards this developed because as i started learning about these questions when i was their age -- i was an undergraduate at the university of chicago, taking classes called things like strategies and arms control, war on the nation state. the sort of very learned materials we read were from great scholars and thinkers that come from places like rand and important universities. they used incredibly sophisticated methods like game.

-- like game theory to sort of explain what they thought should have happened given the consequences of the nuclear revolution. as i became a historian and look ed at records, i was surprised and stunned and humbled to find the gap between what the theorists thought should have happened and what policymakers actually did and how they wrestled with these questions. you take an extreme example -- someone like thomas schelling, 2005 nobel prize winner in economics, perhaps one of the most brilliant strategists of the nuclear age that there ever was, really the father of nuclear strategy. his writings were at the core of our understanding of deterrence, the manipulation of risk. the way he described how policymakers should think about it in terms of how they should assess risks seemed completely

different than the way policymakers thought about it. there was an example of a paper he wrote about during the berlin crisis where he essentially suggested the problem with nuclear weapons is you need to credibly show you can use them , so one thing a president can do in a crisis was the fire one shot somewhere in the middle of the ukraine or russia to show the soviets we meant business. you get the impression this document was circulated around. it got to the president and he said what is this? what person in their right mind would ever think this way? the logic of nuclear weapons were such that the level of responsibility of thinking about using them -- we are going to give a demonstration shot -- so what struck me was there is this gap between the way strategists and intellectuals thought about this question and the way many

day-to-day diplomacy and crises and management of international relations intersected. they were much different. in fact, a few things became clear -- there was not one president, with the possible exception of nixon, everyone made it clear that to push the button to make them disappear, they would. they found the burden of responsability terrible. they understood the arguments on behalf of deterrence. there was this palpable sense of not just responsibility but that it was beyond the thinking. it is interesting. that is not the way we learn about this. there were a series of things like that that may be realize it was one thing to talk about these things theoretically but quite another to talk about them

as the president is thinking about using them. for the students one of the best places you can get a sense for this is listening to the presidential tapes, the kennedy tapes during the cuban missile crisis and afterwards. one gets the sense of the loneliness of president kennedy having to make this decision and how, frankly, unhelpful much of the information he was getting. it was a burden. that is not to say that there is not smart things we can say and that cannot be full for. it is just that i think many people that write on the subject, bomb iran, don't bomb iran, speak with a certainty that has no justification in historical record. that does not mean they were necessarily right but i think more humility would lead to a little more nuanced thinking on questions of extraordinary importance.

gen. kehler: before i answer the question, let me piggyback with professor gavin here. military people do not like them either. i think this is not about liking the weapons. this is about, at least, it has always been for me -- it is not about liking them, it is about understanding the world we live in has them and they have national security implications for us. therefore, we've learned how to do with them which does lead to the question so what does that mean now? i think it is a bit of the chicken and the egg discussion to say the cold war shaped nuclear weapons and vice versa. that is the old -- somebody one said good hitting defeats good pitching and vice versa. there is something to that here as well.

i do believe that the way we talk about them, the way our employment policies were written and disclosed, i think the evolution of massive retaliation to flexible response. all of those things happened were uniquely suited to the cold war. and, as i tried to make the point, this is no longer a cold war world. so, i'm always a little bit leery when we tried to make it like the cold war. so, i think an understanding of what deterrence means in the 21st century is how we should use nuclear weapons -- a friend

of mine says that i have read military friends that say we have never used them and in others you say we use it everyday. i come down on that side of the fence. i believe we use our weapons every single day. but, when we had the cold war with the soviet union, we viewed that as a monolith. we believed we understood how they made decisions. we believed we understood who made those decisions. therefore, when we were trying to construct deterrence strategies, we thought we knew who we were trying to influence and what mattered to them. we need that kind of understanding for a far broader range of adversaries now or potential adversaries. who makes decisions in some of the places with the greatest unrest is? how do you deter them? what combination of things would deter them and how would nuclear

weapons play in that combination? i think that is a different way of approaching our nuclear deterrent in the 21st century. it places great difficulty with the intelligence community because if you go to the intelligence community and say i need to know who makes decisions in this place over here and how they make them and what they value the most, that is a tough problem. it took us a long time to figure that out with the soviet union. be careful about talking with any certainty on any of these subjects. i believe that we have got to understand the world we are in now. this is a very different international security environment that we have faced in the last century. in fact, the compelling security problems of the last century -- imperialism, fascism, nazism communism -- have largely been relegated to the history books. some of it echoes a little bit but largely that is relegated to

the history books. we have a different world today. to assume that we would be structuring our nuclear deterrent the same way we did during the cold war, i think it is a big mistake. understanding this notion of tailored deterrence, what combination of factors will be the most effective in deterring any given country and then understanding that yes, u.s. policy is that we will only consider using nuclear weapons in extreme circumstances when vital national security interests are a stake. does that limit the other nuclear powers provided in the nuclear posture review of 2010? but, by the way, i think that is a worthy goal -- deterring nuclear use by those who have them. i think that is a worthy goal because we are -- sometimes we

talk about the enormous destructive potential in any individual -- one of our individual ballistic missile submarines -- unleashing the equivalent of world war ii out of one platform. that is only half of the description. the other half is you can do it in 30 minutes. these weapons are unlike any other weapons we have. as long as we have them, my view is we better understand how they fit in a grand strategy of deterrence that has to be tailored to individual actors in today's world. mr. avey: we have time for q&a. we have the microphone going out. >> thank you. i really enjoyed the presentation.

to follow a bit of what you just said, you look at deterrence from the standpoint of america's national interests. if you were president rouhani, would you accept the standpoint -- how would you evaluate the nuclear posture, the potential usage, assuming they would not -- would it launch a strike on israel which would lead to the mutual destruction that would follow? >> a complicated question, mr.

ambassador. i demand easier questions. [laughter] i do not think i can speculate on what the iranians would say. i have read in the press that they said they have considered acquiring them for their own national security interests. i don't know that they have made that decision, whether or not to acquire them. when i left the inside conversations a little over a year ago, i thought they had not made their decision yet. i don't know what they would say, exactly. i can tell you what others have said. the russians have been clear that they see their nuclear deterrent as offsetting not only our nuclear arsenal but our conventional to build these as -- capabilities as well. they have written about it publicly since desert storm. what we were able to do conventionally. they call it the reconnaissance strike complex. this marriage of satellites and aircraft and other things that

resulted in precision strikes. countries will pursue these weapons or retain them for their own national security interests. that is part of our deterrence be ableing cablable to understand what those reasons are. >> thank you for coming. i was very interested -- one thing that has really concerned me is the terrorism contest now that we have. terrorism as a policy now that we see. we have always thought nobody

would get on a plane and blow it up because they would die. now, we see that is not always true. how do you factor that in with deterrence? they know if they bomb us, we will bomb back. they don't care. >> a great question. it gets to the credibility of your deterrent. one of the reasons we have taken the position that says that nuclear weapons need to be only one tool in a deterrent toolkit, in some cases our nuclear deterrent -- how does our nuclear deterrent work today in the context of those kinds of threats and the emergence of some very sophisticated conventional capabilities and

perhaps nongenetic capabilities -- non-kinetic capabilities as time passes here? how do we put those pieces together to put a critical question for us. there is not a great deal of certainty here. there is uncertainty associated with all of this. i will say that the threat of violent extremists with a nuclear weapon has been taken very seriously. you can look at the nuclear posturing and other policy documents from several administrations that talk about elevating that to the top of the agenda. that drives the nonproliferation and counter proliferation efforts. which i think are worthy efforts. arms control is at least attached to that in some way as we are secure nuclear materials

and other things p we have taken that challenge very seriously. how would put the right mixture of deterrence factors together and capabilities is a very big question and one causing a lot of my colleagues to lose some sleep. >> i would like to piggyback and ask you both to comment on the likelihood of a nonstate actor getting ahold of a nuclear -- eating a hold of nuclear material. would you talk about some of the regimes you think might be able to access the material? are worried about north korea, pakistan? where might we be worried that nonstate actors and terrorists get a hold of them? >> this has been a priority for

several administrations. something that, at least from the outside, has been a success. a great concern at the end of the cold war -- it is striking how many national security initiatives, how much intelligence sharing how much cooperation there has been on the international front to deal with this absolutely critical issue. there was a period of time immediately after 9/11 when the threat was overstated. partially the threat was overstated partially there has been some extra narrative policy intelligence from international cooperation successes.

it is the most important thing the president has to worry about. obvious places and problems he would worry about, north korea selling things, pakistan collapsing. it is striking that the kind of things we worry about 20 years ago, the initiatives have done a good job of making that less of a concern. it has to be the priority of any administration. >> i agree with that completely. it will never not be a concern. it will always be a concern. >> is it likely? >> this is one of these things were the economic policy divide is at its greatest because oif and academic was to say there is a 99% chance it won't happen

others say because of the .1% -- there is a few you run into who say this is not on the top of their list of things to worry about. if you go to an academic conference, most of my colleagues will say this is not a high probability event and the risks are far lower than they were during the cold war. i have come to the conclusion that that does not help much if you were a policy maker because even if it is low probability, the consequences are so catastrophic and unthinkable you still have to spend an enormous amount of time thinking about it and worrying about it. >> the consequences are so grave , we cannot ever take that from its rightful place, at the top of the agenda. a lot of work has been done and a lot of work goes on now. there are a lot of people who

wake up every day and go to bed at night worrying about this problem. and rightfully so. it is one i don't believe we can ever take our focus off of. >> [indiscernible] how does that conversation fit into u.s. nuclear strategy and the deterrence issue? >> it definitely factors in. if you go back, it was released

in 2012 -- i might have the date wrong -- every president sometime during their term issues new guidance to the military about how we would employ nuclear weapons if deterrence failed. there was none classified fact sheet released and then a report to congress -- congress asked for a nonclassified report and there was one given. it specifically mentions this possibility potential for small limited uses as part of a regional conflict. it is a planning problem that the military has to deal with. it is one that also occupies a lot of deterrence thinking certainly in my former command

and strategic command, there is a lot of thought that goes into how we would make sure we never get to that point, how we make sure we can manage a crisis so that eventuality doesn't become attractive. at the end of the day, this is about the touring that kind of use and making sure that we understand what would compel an adversary to do that, who would make the decisions, what do they value the most. it is a planning problem for us, something that the report said was a possibility, the likelihood of a massive exchange as receded -- i think there is a recognition that we have listened to the russians talk about their new doctrine and

part of their doctrine is perhaps they would use nuclear weapons early as opposed late. >> [indiscernible] >> i would not want to go speculate on that. other than i would say, i think my job was to make sure the president always had options. >> [indiscernible] hundreds of billions of dollars. we spent so much on the war of terror -- spending too much money on the war on terror. >> you have asked another difficult question and it's

about priorities. the statistics of whether or not you will be the subject of a terrorist attack is only part of the story. the issue is that when it occurs , we have people who are killed or injured -- look at the boston marathon. it is a terrible event, a terrible tragedy. doing everything we can possibly do to make sure that doesn't happen belongs in the top priority where it is. i do think as i said, it is not the only priority we have to worry about and is not the only national security priority we have to be concerned about. that balance is going on every day at the pentagon and you have seen it in the press where congress is debating this very issue in the budget debate they are having about the department of defense and whether to exceed

the budget cap amounts etc. that is the ongoing question right now, the need to do many things at once and how do we pay for that while we still maintain our economic strength. a very tough problem. >> i would like to -- it seems we should worry about the use of nuclear weapons. how do you respond to the argument that we should just worry about use of the nuclear weapons and not possession of nuclear weapons? >> a very interesting question. most of our academic studies focus on possession.

proliferation, what states want these weapons, why they want them and very rarely what they will do if they have them. there's lots of arguments about this. that's why i put it -- how you answer that question depends on how you think about these nuclear weapons. there is a large party of thought that thinks that nuclear weapons are not good at getting you things. you cannot take territory with them. they are very bad offensive weapons, they are defensive weapons. when a state wants them, typically it would be to prevent others from interfering in their lives. if that was the argument, someone might say, i don't have to worry about them that much. the general mentioned some

states might want them to prevent the united states from interfering in their business. there's another way of looking at this saying, no, in fact nuclear weapons might embolden leaders. they might encourage them to engage in blackmail, to mimic a great test manipulate the inherent uncertainty of the situation. when i look back to khrushchev during the late 1950's, he had far fewer nuclear weapons that the united states and was honorable to a first strike but was willing to engage in incredibly risky behavior. you could see him making the cancellations -- calculations that the united states would be responsible and back down. nuclear weapons in certain hands , even exploit people's responsibility to get things you

want. it is clear that khrushchev thought this. the americans will back down and we will get what we want. what if they don't? we will try something else. talking about explicit nuclear threats, what khrushchev did it's terrifying. there's completely different arguments here. how you answer that -- it depends on the state question. if you are a state like france you have nuclear weapons, you want them for your own deterrent purposes. sweden wanted them. that's why australia one of them when they wanted them. there's other countries like north korea where it's not clear that they want these for deterrent purposes. the debate centers around iran.

if you think iran just wants them for the dry purposes -- detroit purposes, it's not the end of the world. if you think iran will behave more like khrushchev or north korea, that makes it far more dangerous and far more worrying. i'm of the belief that they would be more likely to have them for deterrent purposes but one cannot know. it all turns upon -- these things are used even when they are not used. how they are used, for purposes of blackmail, coercion is what makes them so terrifying. >> i have a couple of questions. my first is a follow-up to a question with the boston

bombing. how do nuclear weapons deter such actions like the boston bombing? you talked about the nuclear arsenal and how we are modernizing it how does that set up a new arms race -- >> i think it is a stretch to suggest that nuclear weapons would deter someone who is going to do something like the boston bombings. that gets to my point. in the 21st century with the variety of security situations we've faced, understanding how nuclear weapons play in our overall deterrence calculations is very important and there is a lot of work that needs to be

done in that regard. we find ourselves in this interesting, very challenging and may time in world history regarding -- maybe -- it's important to know who was deterred from doing what by what. it is hard to know under what circumstances these weapons really do play a factor. there are some places where they probably do in this new security environment beyond the traditional view that we've had. that requires a lot of academic work. i have made that appeal before at academic institutions like this. one of the reasons i wanted to

come, to stimulate this conversation in a place like this where you all can take this and have these conversations. it is valuable and necessary. the second question about the arms race, we are in a different place today. there's no saying you can't have another nuclear arms race somehow i'm disturbed when parties say they will walk away from treaties. the imf treaty, our arms control treaties because they have been done in a mutual way and have been -- we have enhanced our security. i'm in favor of enhancing our security in whatever way we can go about that. arms control has a piece of that. we are in a bit of a different

environment today than we were in the cold war. modernization does not stimulate a new arms race. we are doing that modernization within a box. a policy box -- it describes how we will go about doing what does -- because we are in the new era , we have a box in which we have limits and numbers that we cannot exceed and that puts another layer of control, if you will. there are economic limiters on what we can actually do. the fact of the matter is, if you look at the three legs of what we've always called the strategic triad, the ballistic

missile submarines at some point will not be safe to put to sea. simply because of the mechanics involved in. i'm not a navy guy or an architect but i believe them when they say that. regarding the bombers, the idea for a replacement bomber is actually more of a dual capable platform. the kind of platform we would use in the conventional sense -- they were conceived as a nuclear bomber, have never been used that way, but have been used as a conventional bomber. we see the realities of the world would suggest there is

need for a long-range penetrating platform. the dual capable nature of the bomber we would need that barber even if we said it was not going to be nuclear. -- we need that bomber. that leads us to the icbm's. doing the upgrade there will be required as well. we find ourselves in a bad place at the worst time, eating to invest -- needing to invest during declining budgets. i'm glad i'm not in that mix every day. even though i lived there, i'm not part of it. >> [indiscernible]

i started thinking about the u.s. big one of the biggest arms exporters -- being one of the biggest arms exporters. then i started thinking about a huge concern is how much does corporatism influence policy. is there -- is it feasible to limit arms exporting?

what is your response to that? >> that is a great question for a professor. [laughter] >> i would say it's a great question for a general. [laughter] it's two separate questions. one is the influence of corporate interests in u.s. natural security policy -- national street policy. -- national security policy. this is one of the subjects i find almost no evidence that any major national security decision was influenced by the desire to make money or to satisfy corporations. this is one of the great mythologies of american foreign-policy.

i have been struck -- this doesn't mean mistakes can be made -- can't be made. there's been very little example of national security leaders saying well, in an ideal world we would not do this but lockheed martin wants us to. you don't ever see that in the documents. i don't think it is true. the second part, i do think arms exports are a tool of u.s. national security policy and open to criticism. one of the many tools this makers have is to provide -- decision-makers have is to provide weapons and support to their allies.

at times, those arms have gotten this have been used for not the best purposes or have fallen into bad hands. it is completely legitimate to critique on a case-by-case basis whether or not those arms export policies have been effective and wise. there have been cases where it has been and cases where it has not been. the point you make about afghanistan, at the time, it appeared wise and was probably an important policy in countering -- you can assess that based on that -- i would separate those two issues out. >> [indiscernible]

>> that is yours general. [laughter] >> there is no question that -- let me separate deterrence and assurance for just a second. those are related but the shorthand for that is coming in deterrence, it's about an adversary. and assurance, it's about an ally.

we used those in the same sentence but they're not the same thing. when ushers in our may not enter an adversary -- assures an ally may not deter an adversary. there is no question in my mind that this notion of what some have called tailored deterrence where you are looking specifically adversary by adversary or actor by actor you pick your way to describe who you are trying to deter, to really have some kind of confidence that you understand how to go about it requires a very very deep understanding of who they are, how they think come what they do, how they decide, who decides -- we did

not know that right away about the soviet union. the intelligence committee has some tremendous tools to try to understand these things -- i think one of the interesting things today is everything is available in open source. look at all the stuff that is out there. adversaries are telling us what they're doing. if we can figure out which twitter account they are using -- i don't even know what twitter is but someone told me it is important. i'm joking. we are awash in information out there that nobody had to go collect conversely -- covertly. how do we use it, how do we understand what's in it?

all of those things are big challenges for everyone in the intelligence committee. my hats off to them. they do a remarkable job actually. this needed to approach something called tailored deterrence is putting a greater demand signal on them that requires them to establish priorities just like everybody else. we cannot do everything at once all the time, unfortunately. even with the tremendous resources, it's about priorities and choices. i was pretty confident that we were getting a handle on a number of these tailored deterrence ideas in various places. we were not starting at zero. i always wanted more intelligence always. i think we have put a pretty big demand signal on the.

-- on them. >> are there any systems that are anti-nuclear? some device that could neutralize the nuclear explosion if triggered or prevent radioactive decay? >> i'm not aware of anything to try to provide a defense against and you armed missile other than missile-defense. -- a nuclear armed missile other than missile-defense. i am not aware of anything that would offer us the ability to

deal with nuclear weapons. china does not have a large system, but the arsenal they have, which they have always structured their public doctrine, they would use it as a second strike, they would never have first used, i'm not sure they'd said anything different about that recently because i have not been paying a great deal of attention to that part of china over the last six months or so. my view is they have a capable force in terms of size. it is not a huge force. they are modernizing their force , they are taking their missiles and making them mobile. that combined with a very extensive underground system of

titles and shelters and things makes that a very difficult problem because i think they have looked to be survivable and are able to survive. they have taken what they believe are steps they need to take. they are about to field a ballistic missile suffering. that will be interesting to see how they operate that. will they always be at sea? how do they intended to use that platform? that has opened up a lot of questions -- before i retired we were trying to work through pacific command and other engagements being held in the military realm to make sure we understood that better. i would like to see more transparency with the chinese and the nuclear force. one thing arms control did

between the united states and the soviet union in russia, it allowed us to get a good feel for how they operated, how they secured their weapons. whether safeguards were. all those things that as a military commander would have made me more comfortable if i knew those things about the chinese. i think that is still their request, they would like to know more about that so that we can share information and not have a lot of uncertainty. that helps with stability in the long run. >> the reason we were at odds with the soviet union was over economics.

[indiscernible] how does economics factor into that? we know nuclear weapons cost a lot to maintain. what is the minimum threshold for nuclear weapons? what is the minimum threshold for the u.s.? >> i would say the u.s. competition with the soviet union certainly had an economic

component but also a very strong geopolitical competition over the future of western europe and east asia and an ideological competition. nuclear weapons were deeply meshed in this competition. it would be wrong to make a direct parallel to the u.s.-china relationship. as he pointed out, there is certainly many areas of competition but also many areas of interdependence. you can look at the u.s.-china nuclear relationship as a success to a certain extent. if you were to say -- to have predicted china's capabilities

based on their economic and technological base and assumed they were a rival, one could imagine a counterfactual world where they had built far more than they had. it is far less than they are capable of. absolutely, one wants more interaction. in some ways, you have not seen the action-reaction cycle between the u.s. and china that you saw with the u.s. and soviets. lots of people working on this question of how low can you go, what deterrence as low numbers. what is the minimal amount -- there is a big debate about this. how you answer that question depends on how you answer some of the questions i laid out in my remarks. there are various views on this. some people think that's we have

reduced quite significantly -- going much lower might be problematic. there are others who think we can go much further. >> let me push back on something you said. two things you said. when you said that the contest between the united states and soviet union was about economics , if what you mean by that is the ideological struggle that was inherited and communism, i will agree with you. that is the context piece. the second thing you said are nuclear weapons -- is nuclear weapons are expensive. throughout history, they have not been expensive. early in the cold war, they were chosen as the offset for conventional comparison. as it turns out, what the

problem here with the investment is we find ourselves having to invest in the a lot of different things all at the same time here . once you feel these weapons, they are not expensive to sustain and operate -- field these weapons. the question about -- i'm not minimizing the expense of modernization or life extension of the warheads. unfortunately, the facts are that the systems are going to wear out and we will have to invest. the question about how many do we need -- there is clearly a debate about that. there are a lot of factors that go into the answer to the question. how many do we need? what objectives does the

president want to achieve it turns fails -- if deterrence fails? that is a military question. if deterrence fails, i want you to do the following things. it was always the starting point for me. i never started with how many we think will be enough. i always started with how many it takes to achieve these objectives. that becomes a military planning problem. in this case, you also factor in arms control. there is an arms control shall around this conversation as well. the new start, the treaty of force right now and the question about what a favorable negotiation might look like.

there are a lot of factors that go into this answer to how many do we need and it is not just an answer that someone like this anyone -- would anyone be deterred by x number. maybe, maybe not. it was based primarily on the objectives, the difference objectives we were asked to achieve. -- deterrence objectives we were asked to achieve. >> i apologize that i can get to everybody but it's a fabulous discussion and fascinating topic. as professor gavin mentions, the nuclear balance is not just a mechanical question. the issue of nuclear crises and nuclear deterrence -- if you

think about the was in china going forward, it's important to look at the political issues at stake. i was also struck, something you said about the power of one submarine and the store near you part -- the extraordinary harm once every can do. there's nothing like them in human history. they are the only genuine weapons of mass destruction. setting aside issues of cost and budgets, it's important to keep the conversation going about these weapons. they deserve continuing scrutiny. i would like to thank all of you for helping with that discussion and join me in thanking them for leading us on. [applause]

>> we are adjourned. >> as the iranian nuclear negotiations continue in switzerland, we will bring you a discussion this evening called "hope for disappointment." -- "hope for disappointment." life coverage here on c-span beginning at 6:30 p.m. eastern -- live coverage here on c-span beginning at 6:30 p.m. eastern. >> jim's full he was beheaded by isis -- james fully was beheaded by isis.

-- james foley. the panel includes terry anderson who was held hostage by iran for seven years. here's a preview. >> we really had no person in the government to go to. we had no one who was accountable for jim or any of the others who were kidnapped. i started a series of trips to washington, going to state department and fbi just to remind them that jim was still missing. we did not know if he was alive or not. they were very disappointed -- we were very disappointed. we had no access to anyone with any power or any information or .

we were not allowed to be part of the -- i know we can do better. at many points, i was appalled at the way we were treated in some instances. >> it's important that for a year and a half, diane and i were both told that jim's situation was the highest priority. everything possible was being done to bring him home. they could tell us nothing because everything was classified. >> you can see the entire event tonight on c-span starting at 9:00 eastern. >> next, a discussion on the impact of immigration policies on on not meet student -- on undocumented students. also findings of a new report

detailing the experiences of undocumented students in higher education. >> thank you and good morning, everyone come on this lovely and bright, sunny morning. i know that everyone is glad that winter is over. i'm the senior policy analyst for generation progress, the youth engagement are for the center for american progress and think you so much for coming to talk about the subordinate. -- to talk about this important event. this work involves coordinating efforts across such -- felicia previously worked with the

legislative team working to develop the legislative agenda on a host of issues including labor, civil rights, judicial nominations and immigration. i was also in high school at the time and room for doing the marches all across the country when that was happening. it's a distinct honor to have her here for this. she was the associate director of the senate democratic -- help cultivate relationships between democratic leader tom daschle and key stakeholder groups. she started her career as a state policy analyst working for the national council where she represented and clr and his work -- advocating for education come

immigrant access to benefits and hate crime legislation. felicia is a native of san antonio, texas. she reserved -- received her undergraduate degree from meal university -- from yale university. [applause] >> thank you so much. it is great to see you all indoors. it is finally wonderful and sunny today. i appreciate you all being here. i'm excited to hear about the conversation -- i was just talking to my fellow about the research they've been doing at ucla. roberto has done some research on students, their outcomes barriers for those who have access the program to come forward. i know you all will have a

wonderful discussion. i'm here to talk about what the administration is up to and hopefully we can all work together to continue to help individuals get that access to temporary relief and work authorization. for those of you who don't know what dr. is -- daca is, it was announced in june of 2012 and implemented in august of 2012. we had 60 days to work with dhs to get the program up online so that young people who know this country, no this is their only country, grew up pledging allegiance to our flag, can come out of the shadows and get access to a temporary status called deferred action and be eligible to apply for work authorization. since the program was launched in august of 2012, several hundred thousand -- 650,000 individuals have come forward and received daca.

we were doing the research on whether to do the program all caps do the program -- or how do the program, we have is that there would be people who would agent to the program over time -- age into the program over time. the fact that we've been able to bring 650,000 folks out of the shadows out of that one million to us is a success. the bigger challenge is tackling immigration reform and we all want to get to passage of comprehensive, meaningful immigration reform that would affect the 11 million. employers who are doing right by the system and are getting undercut iby unscrupulous employers -- there are things we

can do. daca's new example of something we are doing to make sense of the system. you have to find ways to make the law work for the country work for our economy work for our communities at work for immigrants, refugees and others. since then, we had and unsuccessful efforts to pass legislation in the congress. we did get a piece of legislation that was not perfect it pretty good. we were not able to get something passed out of the house to form a bill that could to the president's desk. as a result of this, the president had a conversation with speaker boehner about his interest in seeing legislation get done.

we were only a few months left and the last congress and we felt our window was going to slip if they did not act last year. the speaker was having his own challenges, as it speakers often do, and was not able to move legislation forward. the president decided he could wait no longer for legislation to happen in the house and wanted us to look at the current law and see what else we could do to make the system work better. we have done some work around making our enforcement priorities smarter and more effective so that they are going after the serious criminals national security there is ongoing work in that space.

we also have done a lot to -- something that wasn't really highlighted as much but is starting to get highlighted more as things get rolled out -- we announced a punch of changes we were going to make to the legal immigration system. things like changing regulations to allow s.t.e.m. students who graduate who were foreign born to stay in our country and continue to contribute while getting their education. there's been some changes related to people who are waiting, h-1b workers who are waiting in the backlogs, the green k5rd backlogs -- green card backlogs, to the allow their spouses to work in our country so we don't lose their talent, and they don't leave the country and can actually help improve the economy by allowing their spouses who are often very skilled as well to work and to get work authorization. of course, the big thing that got the headline and continues to get the headline is our expansion of the daca program and the creation of the deferred action for parents of u.s. citizens and lawful permanent residents program. the daca program. so those two, the changes that we made to daca to expand that program and the creation of the daca program would have impacted -- will impact about four million people. so as you all know, we are

currently in litigation working towards getting to a place where we can actually implement these two reforms. we were about to implement them in february of this year, and we -- a texas district court judge has stopped us from doing that by issuing a preliminary injunction. so we feel very confident ability our ability to implement -- about our ability to implement the program and to continue to expand the daca program. we wouldn't have pursued them if we didn't. and it was actually a very healthy debate within the administration, dhs, doj and others around the table about whether we could create a dapa program and whether we could expand the daca program. so before we made that decision, we felt very confident in our legal footing and in our ability to -- and our authority -- to do that. despite that, we're dealing with the challenges in the courts and we'll continue to aggressively pursue our remedies.

but really in the meantime since we can't implement those programs, it is really important to focus on all the other things that were announced and the successes of the daca program. you know, really it's amazing to me, i meet people every day or every week, the president has met many people who have benefited from daca. he's received letters from parents, from kids who have as a result of daca been able to really pursue their dreams, but also contribute to our country. so we hear about people who are, you know, now at mass general becoming mds, people who were working in the service sector which is an honorable profession, right? if that's what you, be that's what you pursue. but if you have the skills to do more and contribute more, we want you to do that. so we have people who are now helping create i.t. structures things i don't really understand in terms of the technical and i.t. world, engineers, attorneys, other health professionals.

and so that's really something that we continue just to to celebrate at the white house. because it gives us inspiration to continue the work that we're doing to pursue the larger reforms legislatively, but also our administrative reforms that are temporarily spotted -- stopped at this point. i'm excited to hear about the wonderful research folks have been doing. it helps us build the case for our continued action in the daca expansion and dapa space because we know the individual one-on-one stories, but you do need the research to help back up some of the claims and some of those anecdotes that you hear. so i look forward to hearing about that. and just one other thing we are thinking a lot about is the renewal process. everyone got daca, we want them to keep it as long as they're qualified. i know one big worry i had as we were rolling out the new programs was that people would

forget about the fact that they actually have to renew their status. the daca status is a two-year status, it's temporary status but we did last year roll out the process for how you can renew your status. it's -- we've tried to keep it streamlined so that people who have already proved educational requirements don't have to resubmit documents and things like that. and as of this -- as of now about 150, 200,000 individuals have submitted and received renewal. that's a good number of the folks that their numbers were coming up. one challenge we have is that it's a rolling bay -- basis right? it's not the kind of thing where everyone had to reply by x state so everyone's status will be up on y date. everyone chose to receive daca at different times, so it's important as we do our work talking about the successes that we also remind people that in order to continue in those successes and to reach even further, that individuals do renew their status.

i often say that, you know everyone is a little bit, can be a little bit tardy, young people in particular with meeting deadlines, and the professors in the room probably know that better than i do. so it's important that we all remind people that they need to apply at least 120 days before their status runs out, but at -- but really on the 150-day mark is when you can start applying and folks should really be striving to apply at that point. but anyway, so thank you very much for hosting this event and for continuing the discussion about our successes with daca and happy to answer a couple questions or, if not, i can turn it back over to the man who's going to start the panel. if i answered all the questions, that's fine. yes. >> naomi verdugo with army. has the texas injunction impacted the ability ore new or the

length that they can renew for? >> uh-huh. so the injunction has not stopped the 2012 program at all. people can still come forward if they haven't applied before, and people can still renew their status. the one piece of this that did get impacted by the injunction is we actually were -- we announced in november that we were going to give people three-year status versus two-year status. that right now is -- we have reverted back to the initial the original two-year status. so people do have to renew every couple years. well, great. well, enjoy the rest of your day and enjoy the wonderful, the wonderful panel. thank you. [applause] >> thank you so much, felicia. right now i think we would like to turn it over to the co-investigative -- principal

investigators for the reports you all pretty much have in your hands. when this report came out, it was in the shadows of the ivory tower, it sort of highlighted a lot of the issues we've been talking about and hearing stories about for many, many years, and so i'm really excited for them to go over some of the principal points of the report. so i'd like to invite the co-director of the institute for immigration globalization and education at the university of california at los angeles as well as dr. marcelo -- who is also a co-principal investigator of the report where they're going to go over the report for us for a couple of minutes so we can all sort of see the issues that we're dealing with right now. >> thank you so much. thank you. thank you, c.a.p.

for organizing this event. three features at the heart of the current u.s. immigration are in some ways quite unique. first, we have a large, the largest number of immigrants in the world, the second largest country of immigration today is the russian federation, and we have e three times more -- and we have three times more immigrants.

the second fundamental feature is today's immigrants are the most diverse in the history of our country. if you take our two largest cities, if you take new york and los angeles, children from approximately 185 plus different countries and territories who got up this morning got onto bikes, got into subways, got into cars, to buses to go to school. that simply has never happened before in the history of the world. our cities now contain entire range of the human, of the human condition. in los angeles we have something that, again, has never happened before in human history. we have roughly a dozen plus nations that now have los angeles as their second largest city. thomas jefferson once said we all have two cities. he was right. the world has two cities today their own and l.a., los angeles and new york. arkansas, armenia,

cambodia, el salvador, guatemala, mexico. these are countries that now have their second largest population in los angeles. another fundamental feature is the tolerant that we've -- tolerance that we've developed over the last two generations for a very, very large number of unauthorized immigrants in our country. we're less than 5% of the world's population, today we probably have about a quarter of all the unauthorized in the world. of course, the current pause in the comprehensive immigration reform seems to be set on a kind of intermin bl mode.

and and as we continue to deal with what flush shah called a broken -- felicia called a broken system, immigration remains -- our concern or our attention to immigration remains episodic. now we pay attention, now we don't. and it's mostly crisis-driven. yet, of course, the story of the great mass wave of immigration of the last two generations is a story that has unfolded quietly and behind the scenes, the story of the unauthorized, young emerging adults. in college is really fundamentally about the working, the long-term workings of immigration mt. long, in the long run -- in the long run. over the last generation, we've seen the children brought to our country grow and graduate from

our schools at larger, in larger numbers, and we have in this emerging and somewhat more recent phenomenon of large numbers of unauthorized in colleges. as our country continues its long pause on immigration, young people are a big, bug part of the -- a big, bug part of the college experience in our country today. we recently surveyed 909 undocumented undergraduates across 34 states that immigrated to our country from 55 different countries, and they attended an

array of two and four-year public and private colleges that range in selectivity. it's the large study of its kind focusing on the experiences of emerging adults in the college setting. the students are studying hard and working hard, and they long to belong. the majority of them, 68%, are first generation to college. not unique to this population, but nevertheless a challenge to them as they have limited guides to navigate in and through college.

their major of choice by far were the s.t.e.m. fields science, technology, engineering and mathematics, which accounts for 28.5% of the reported majors. and, clearly, are relevant fields for the 21st century knowledge-intensive economy. they yet live in limbo. many feel invisible, overwhelmed and psychosocially stressed. the data in the report paint a an alarming picture of what undocumented college students are facing in our country today.

there is a tremendous amount of juggling in the lives of these young folk. our data suggests that 61.3% of undocumented students are coming from families living on an annual household income of less than $30,000 a year. 72% of them were working while attending college, taxing heavily their ability to succeed academically. work and stability. -- more than half of the students in our survey, 56.7%

reported being extremely concerned about paying for their college education. there you have some of the quotes. there are clusters of concerns around housing work and , stability. among the students who reported stopping their studies temporarily, and 73.9% indicated financial difficulties the primary course for stopping now of college. 72% -- 72% of those who were working reported complications

from having to juggle long hours at work, difficult and stable commutes and their study him and often felt left out to life in their own experiences. i study also found that more than three quarters of the students reported significant word about their own detention and deportation.

more than 55% indicated that they personally i know someone who has been deported, including a parent in 5%, 7% of the cases or a sibling and 3.2% of the cases. one of the most alarming things in the study given to the subject, the combination of financial hardship and fear of deportation created a perfect, perfect psychosocial storm of stress and anxiety. undocumented women college students reported the rates that triple the norm of the general population.

37% versus 9%. that is about the clinical level. the males in the sample had anxiety rates five times higher than the norm population. 29% versus 4% being the cut rate for clinical levels of anxiety. adding to the stress, the majority of the subjects, 67.6% were first generation to college with neither parent having attended schools. these are the anxiety attacks. that's very critical chapter in

the origins of totalitarianism talks about what happens in a democracy when subjects lose the right to have rights. children youth comic emerging adults, huge, huge numbers and the longing to belong. on average, the emerging adults in our study arrived in the united states when they were six years of age. when felicia said this is the only country they know, this is in fact correct. the children are de facto non-bayshore american children

in the most fundamental identity clusters that faith are -- that shape our phenomenology of experience, our sense of who we are. they are american in all aspects. indeed, an overwhelming 90.4% of respondents reported they would become u.s. citizens if given the chance. they report a relatively high levels of civic engagement in ways that are not often registered by our standard mechanisms for assessing civic comportment and civic engagement in the social sciences. of course, the young folks in the

study face real uncertainties about their future in the united states. i will now turn it over to robert and will address direct the policy issues relating to higher education institutions serving the students. thank you very much. [applause]

>> i discuss some of the finance of the student level. i will focus the results relevant to policy. a very important contribution of the study is its ability to represent the remarkable heterogeneity in the undocumented student population. so, undocumented students are black, white, latino asian-american and pacific islander. the representing positions among the full spectrum of the socioeconomic status. they also have a range of immigration history. as marcelo mentioned originating from 55 countries of origin, speaking a wide range of variety of languages and dialects. every type of post secondary institution. we have respondents from two-year institutions, for your institutions, public and private institutions and again as marcelo mentioned, colleges that range inactivity.

the demographic portrait of undocumented students who responded to the survey tells us to think that i think are very important. first, no college or university should assume that these issues are not relevant to their campus community. second, the hired community needs to the beyond the false assumptions that often drive their understanding and treatment of this population. we focused some of our analysis on the impact of higher education, so we were very fortunate to correct data at a point after daca has been implemented and students had it for a year, year and a half. it afforded us the opportunity to get a sense of what happens for students with and without daca. it is important to acknowledge that daca does not do anything explicitly for college students.

so we were interested in the indirect benefits, limitations and the opportunity for pushing the boundaries of what daca can do relative to access and opportunity in higher education. so, we found one key benefit of daca with the ability to afford undocumented college students that they were permitted. so that daca recipients were more likely than non-recipients to be working. this resulted in greater financial well-being for undocumented students. not only did additional income help offset the cost of college, daca recipients reported that their jobs were more commensurate with their future career aspirations. we are also interested in daca on access to internships. many internship providers have residency restrictions.

this has been a barrier for undocumented college students. and we found that students with daca were twice as likely to have an internship experience compared to students without daca. over three quarters of the students with internships reported experiences provided skills that prepare them for future work. this is important considering a number of students reported that internships were actually a prerequisite for careers in their field. we also found that more than half of the students with internships received compensation and again, this is important for overcoming barriers associated with college affordability. a large proportion of the respondents reported being commuter students. more than three quarters of the students. this may transportation and

housing, particularly feeling -- particularly salient issues when it comes to their ability to succeed academically. we found it is what daca were more likely to have drivers licenses. they have shorter commute times and they spent more time on campus. we also found daca enables students to more stable housing. if you think about that as a college student, these are very important elements to the ability of students to be able to focus on their studies. the data also revealed a greater sense of optimism for college. -- for life after college. one indicator with a higher proportion of daca recipients during an advanced degree compared to the non-recipients. however, it is important to acknowledge the negative consequences that the provisional nature of daca. open-ended questions, students talked about being cautiously optimistic about their futures because they were sure if they

-- they were not sure if they were ever going to fully realize some of their goals. so this is a good segue to the other side of the success story when it comes to daca. namely, there are limitations to what daca could do. barriers and challenges continue to impede access to higher education for documented students. there is a lot of discussion about college affordability when it comes to undocumented students. this continues to be a major barrier that impacts access and success for undocumented students. the undocumented students are dealing with ambiguous policies, a lack of information and inconsistencies in how institutions determine tuition and financial aid. for example, while some states

have established inclusive tuition policies, other states have explicit exclusionary policies. however, what this chart shows is that most states have absolutely on stipulated tuition policies. so this is important because the difference between out-of-state and in-state tuition is very large. and in-state tuition is very large. average out-of-state tuition is about $23,000 a year and that is more than double the typical in-state tuition of about $9000 a year. regardless in-state tuition policies, there's also the institutional level. one example of how this plays out is when undocumented students, they apply to a college and then they are treated as an international student, which automatically gives them tuition levels that are different than what would be experienced for in-state