part of the insurgency at that time and certainly were al qaeda linked. how would you describe the insurgency inside iraq@@@@@@@@@ á coming back from iraq or overtime have been killed or

captured. many criminals are now being used in order to attempt to try to conduct some of these activities and so it is a different understanding of those elements. over all i would just continue to emphasize the security around most of the country is fairly normal. and only a few places to we have serious incidents and many places life has returned to normal inside iraq. >> how do you see the combat support elements of the iraqi and today? read a largely dependent on the united states were increasingly independent? >> they are better but they are still not where the need to be to be completely independent. they still need our support. part of the area that is hurting the iraqis if tech to become a security force is to put a freeze on hiring based on their budget constraints and and nine,

ten, and 11 is when they were supposed to build the csis and if they continue to have the freeze the want of the individuals to fill the position so that as part of the problem. we are working with them to ensure that happens but over all, we have seen improvement. but it's not get where we believe it can be completely independent of providing thus pss. >> , a description of factor today? obviously in 2005, 2006 it was a factor. how would you evaluate today? >> corruption is still problematic, still endemic inside iraq, iraqi society and however we are starting to see i know specifically the interior minister defense they are taking specific steps in order to counter corruption. we have seen the rest of two ministers involved in corruption. we've seen the firing of some

generals involved in corruption so they are starting to understand the importance of government officials being accountable for their actions and the fact that corruption will not be accepted. i still think we will have years for them to solve this problem but they are beginning to move on the right path. >> thank you. >> thank you, mr. chairman and general and secretary in july you had pretty much passed the 40 month mark at least when we were deciding you. when they were at the history books of this whole conflict. your service stands out and terms of your persistence and again the fact there are so many empty seats in this room is the ultimate statement how successful you have been. two years ago this topic you couldn't move and a committee hearing room and again i think that by itself says a lot.

one of the other things to years ago when general petraeus testified he was joined by ambassador crocker to sort of report in from iraq and obviously some things have changed. the green zone has now been disbursed in terms of the new u.s. embassy and you are in a different physical location, and as congressman sanchez indicated the political challenges facing iraq are still as much a part of the end game as it was two years ago. how is the relationship between your office or you interact, and what efforts are still being made by ast to keep moving forward on the political and? >> thank you so much for the question. we interact every single day. we probably meet personally three or four times a week. i have an office in the embassy. i also have about 300 people

within mnfi that are in support of economic police, training, other agencies, planning that are there every single day working with the embassies we are completely integrated at every level and continue to be completely integrated. we are updating the campaign plan which is a joint plan between ambassador hill and myself. we are working very hard, very closely together. it's very important because it really is going to sit with the deliverable are as we transition to civilian capacity building once the military completes the capacity building. the way i put it to my people is in 2003 we had the chance to do this and we didn't do it quite right. we have a chance now and have to make sure we have the planning and the deliverable is necessary to make sure this works as we've reduced presence and we are hand in hand during a joint process

with the embassy and i feel very comfortable with this. so i believe we have a good system in place. every meeting i told we have a member of the embassy at the meeting. so i think our relationship is good. ambassador hill and i work closely together on a daily basis. as i tell him the only thing ambassador hill and i disagree with every day is if he is a red sox fan and i yankee fan and besides that we do pretty well. >> i decided at the state department -- to follow-up on senator conaway comment on so far there has been time spent to balance the jurisdiction issues in terms of if there was dispute and how to resolve disputes and i think again, you were talking in july when we were over there about the fact it was still kind of new to people and we were trying to get it on up the

street level and rather have it go above. i was wondering -- do you find to have to kind of referee or at least the system requires a referee? >> we are honest brokers is how i would put it in some of these issues is that sometimes we become the honest broker and the and we will work with both sides to come up with the right solution. those times are becoming less and less but we still have many issues, the honest broker so what we try to do is play a role that allows iraqi to solve it with us facilitating the process for them to solve each problem, and that is a change in mind said we have to have. it's not that we have less leverage, it's that it is different today than what it was and it needs to be different because the security agreement because we recognize their sovereignty and want to build the capacity to solve the problems themselves so it is our responsibility to help insure they solve them in any way we can. >> you mentioned that the money was a substantial sum of money returned. why is it happening?

the need isn't there? >> a couple of things. first, some of the money was originally used to pay the sons of iraq and that was the first to enter a 47 million. the iraqis took over the payment of the sons of iraq so that is why we needed this and turned it over. the other thing is we also had 270 million of iraqi money they gave so we used their money before using our money. so, both of those combinations allow us to turn back some and the other thing is obviously now we are very careful we will not do projects we know we cannot track and make sure they are successfully completed and so sometimes we don't have the capacity to ensure these projects are done properly and finished properly. so i think that all of those contributed to us turning the money back and i want to emphasize it is still a very important program. we still need some money the next few years to do this but it

will be a request obviously less than it has been in the past. >> mr. schuster for five minutes. >> thank you, mr. chairman and general ramallah thanks for serving. my colleague from connecticut said when they read the story about iraq your name will be prominent in that story because in my several trips over i can't remember a time i have not met with you in iraq. this is the first time i think i have seen you out of iraq the last several years again appreciate the service and secretary vickers, we know you are an old hand at afghanistan's a thank you for being here. general, you said in the last trick in june that november, december from january and february will be the key months to months before the election, two months after as to whether we will be able to continue the draw down and i think you mentioned here today that you don't foresee that happening but violence will be one of those things we look at. is that the t