comparable to iran vis-a-vis kuwait and saudi arabia. so oman has a special niche and it needs to be seen as exceptional in the aberration but with reason for its own strategic national interest as it formulates them. and so oman is for not interfering any further than the dccc countries have with the language they used in their communique. >> another question from the audience. please tell us about the dccc's decision to form a regional security force is in front real rhetoric who's going to finance it? who's going to pay for it? >> that's a good question. i think like a number of other wishes, the expectations exceed the likely near term achievements. at the end of the liberation of kuwait in 1991, one of the dccc countries proposed that there should be a pan-dccc force built on top of the other one that existed in northwestern saudi arabia to 100,000. and people -- i met with these and the question was why 100,000? well, it's the same size as one of the iraqi republican guards. and we think that if we had something that big that this

comparable to iran these of the kuwait. -- vis-a-vis kuwait. it has to be seen as exceptional. oman is not interfering any further within the gcc countries and the language they use in their communications. >> another question from the audience. please tell us about usgcc's decision about who is going to pay for it in finance it. >> that is a good question. like a number of -- like a number of other wishes and expectations, they exceed the near term achievements. at the end of the liberation of kuwait in 1991, one of the gcc countries proposed that there should be a pan- gcc force built on top of the one that already existed in northwest kuwait. i met with these proposals and asked why 100,000? they said it was the same size as one of the iraqi republican guards. this would give them pause to threaten us. when they put it under the microscope, three countries said it is all we can do to build our national armed forces and posture and we are not doing that well. we're not doing that effectively or economically. to add another burden that simultaneously we try to build and train

this would apply to kuwait's seemingly more risky investments, early in british petroleum, kuwait, which used to be the gulf oil companies and oil installations, property and atlanta, even those would seem to be conservative and traditional it risk free, in contrast to some of saudi arabia's which are even more traditional and conservative. the total amount that they have a vested -- invested abroad is roughly $1 trillion. half of that roughly is in the end -- is in the united stats, and there's been no economic pressure since 1974, the last arab oil embargo was terminated. there has been an interlocking of financial and economic an increasingly commercial linkages through a degree of interdependence and mutuality of benefit and representative for property or reciprocity of reward that was probably not even dreamed of two decades ago. as well as the number of american companies based in the d.c. -- the gcc region have increased themselves by 50% in the last five years. they are up from 500 companies to 750 companies. in the gcc region. at the corporate level and at the intergovernmental

kuwait was a major contributor to that fund and the fund managers delegated kuwait to administer it. since 1986, situate has been in the nuclear issue there. and research through kuwait institute for science and research and the kuwait university and elsewhere have come up with the equivalent of double-hulled vessels. after the spills of the exxon valdezes, and the notions -- if hulls, and have double hulls hole and the first can take a blunt of a iceberg or a blast or subterfuge of some kind but the ship would set aright because there's a second hull. and their view on this and that's worth looking at if you're concerned about the contagion and the radiation possible effects from a chernobyl-like disaster. second, i've sat in meetings with iraqis, kuwaitis and the iranis and the kuwaitis are most alarmed with these people in the meeting. and it's concluded if there's any accident at the plant which is the one closest to the gulf and the one for which the russians are the contracted suppliers of the fuel, that this would immediately have a contagion effect of psychological proportion

that's what i heard when i went to kuwait on things giving. that's what my concerns are for the american people? a senator: will the senator yield for a question? mr. barrasso: how much time do i have remaining, please? the presiding officer: the senator has used the time yielded to him. mr. barrasso: thank you, mr. president. mr. mcconnell: how much time remains on this side? the presiding officer: three minutes and eight seconds. mr. mcconnell: mr. president, regretfully, due to the schedule that the majority has set, we're going to be unable to finish the defense bill before the current funding authority expires at midnight on friday. and as we all know, the president will be out of the country. the house of representatives anticipating this problem, sent over a continuing resolution that would take care of the operations of this remaining portion of the government unfunded through december the 31st. with the president out of the country, of course, this would have to be flown over to him to be signed. with the country at war and troops in

this was not in kuwait. as is so often the case and i say this with affection when you were getting a briefing from the military there was a powerpoint and in fact i think there must be a loss of more than you are not allowed to get a briefing from the military without a powerpoint. there was a powerpoint and there was a lot of important people in the room. there were command staff, there were lots of people that clearly had the military command authority in the area but they turned over the discussion of a logcap contract to why women in the room. clearly a civilian and maybe the most knowledgeable about the logcap contract in the room and i think they turned it over to her because she was the one trying to make the trains run on time in a lot about it. she put up a powerpoint showing the logcap contract by year end as many of you remember the first year of the logcap contract wildly exceeded the estimates by billions of dollars. i think i can remember now and i haven't gone back to look but my recollection

i was being shown in kuwait -- as you put it, that is where everything jumps off.the transportation program of how they were shipping material from kuwait to iraq. a very competent lieutenant colonel was in charge of this, and he was very much on top of the whole thing. i ask him, are you army corps reserve? he said, i am reserve board. he said he has a distribution manager for walmart. for once, the army has the right joint of the civilian experience and the military assignment. that may be a jumping off the pick up on where you have led us with their opening statement. the challenge in afghanistan where, as you correctly noticed, r which is a counterinsurgency kind of battle, which means the contractors cannot sit back and say i have done my job, but i am not engaged in the counterinsurgency, because the way we deal with counterinsurgency, to take the slogan of the iraq surgeon -- surge, you contacted and you build it -- it must work hand in glove and cannot have its own separate command and control system and its own separate management plan without being comple

i was being shown in kuwait -- as you put it, that is where everything jumps off. the transportation program of how they were shipping material from kuwait to iraq. a very competent lieutenant colonel was in charge of this, and he was very much on top of the whole thing. i ask him, are you army corps reserve? he said, i am reserve board. he said he has a distribution manager for walmart. for once, the army has the right joint of the civilian experience and the military assignment. that may be a jumping off the pick up on where you have led us with their opening statement. the challenge in afghanistan where, as you correctly noticed, we have as many contractors -- personnel as we have military personnel. that ratio will stay the same. if we may not end up with more contractor personnel than military personnel. they are both engaged in exactly the same thing, which is a counterinsurgency kind of battle, which means the contractor cannot sit back and say i have done my job, but i am not a engaged in the counterinsurgency. because the way we deal with counterinsurgency

i was being shown in kuwait -- as you put it, that is where everything jumps off.g material from kuwait to iraq. a very competent lieutenant colonel was in charge of this, and he was very much on top of the whole thing. i ask him, are you army corps reserve? he said, i am reserve board. he said he has a distribution manager for walmart. for once, the army has the right joint of the civilian experience and the military assignment. that may be a jumping off the pick up on where you have led us with their opening statement. the challenge in afghanistan where, as you correctly noticed, we have as many contractors -- personnel as we have military personnel. that ratio will stay the same. if we may not end up with more contractor personnel than military personnel. they are both engaged in exactly the same thing, which is a counterinsurgency kind of battle, which means the contractor cannot sit back and say i have done my job, but i am not a engaged in the counterinsurgency. because the way we deal with counterinsurgency, to take the slogan of of the iraq research, is tha

kuwait sold its 4.1 billion stake in citi group today making a profit of more than i billion dollars.anks this weekend raising the total for the year to 130. and "the blindside" won the weekend box office. i'm russ mitchell, cbs news. >> simon: tim donaghy was at the top of his game. a referee in the national basketball association, he loved the limelight, was considered one of the n.b.a.'s better refs, and was making almost $300,000 a year. but he was also living a secret life-- during the last four years of his 13-year career, he committed a personal foul. he betrayed the fans and the league by betting on n.b.a. games, including some he was officiating. donaghy won about 75% of his bets, an incredible percentage, confirmed by the f.b.i. tonight, tim donaghy speaks out publicly for the first time, telling us why he bet on n.b.a. games, how he won so often, how his world collapsed. and what a world it was. it was your dream job. >> tim donaghy: yes. >> simon: why? >> donaghy: i had the opportunity to run up and down the court with the greatest athletes in the world. i just loved the g

what about bush i getting ready to send troops into kuwait and it is eaten up pretty damn quickly. >>important point which is the incredible abuse of the emergency provision and obama and bush are tied at this point having pushed through about $880 billion worth of emergency supplementals. bush, i mean, think of how different the concept of -- to me an emergency is something you can't expect and therefore can't budget for inçó advance, like a forest fire or like a hurricane katrina. the entire seven wars and going is being paid for as an emergency solution. and there are ways to deal with that that we could talk about and -- >> let me ask larry and frances a question keying off something bill said earlier. you suggest or pointed out in the 1990's it was a crisis of crisis of government that enabled you to reach some kind of an agreement. do you think that it's going to take a crisis, an economic crisis, a dollar crisis, something like that in order to overcome the very significant political obstacles that we have been talking about for the last hour? larry? >> absolutely. >> you do? >

kuwait is for to start doing something like this. jordan, syria, southeast asia, singapore, malaysia, bangladesh, these are all over. i think that there are things that you can learn. this is replacing a social network. >> is there a country out there that we could look to and say that they've had moderate success? in terms of the face to face disengagement, the saudis have done this a long list. singapore often gets talked about as a very successful program, but it has dealt with 60 people, by which are clear. this is a very specific program, but the libyans just tried to do something to disengage these guys. the egyptians did this with the islamic group to disengage them. there are things that we can look at. there is very low don this -- there is very little done on this. >> how great is the threat here? great britain seems to be a growing threat in the united states. . . >> if you have more people thinking bad thoughts, it is more likely someone will do something about that. as we uncover these plots, it is hard, because the comp

, when kuwait was occupied by saddam hussein's forces.so to throw back at you in that sense, is it too narrow to judge united states only by the worst things that happened or only by the best things that happened, or is there some way to take all the elements into account? >> that is why i say it is confusing when it comes to the middle east in the arab world and the muslims. if you go back to the early 1950's, you find that the united states was split on the issue of recognition of the state of israel. the state department was opposed. president truman was basically advocating a state. until 1956, we did not support the state of israel. we're opposed even supporting it through arms or enter into any kind of negotiations are treaties with israel. -- four treaties with israel. with john f. kennedy, we had problems with the state of israel. relations were not always very cordial. in terms of united states relationship with the muslim world, despite the fact that the muslim world accounts for 18% of jobs in the united states for imports or e

evacuating are stuck both through kuwait and jordan as well. -- our stock both through kuwait and jordanas well. a lot of it is going to afghanistan. a lot of the things coming out of iraq are getting a very rapid rehab in theater and are making their way to afghanistan to be able to support the additional troop requirements there. what i told the troops in iraq is that the most dangerous thing that our corps is doing today is happening in afghanistan. the most important thing we're doing today is happening in iraq. and that is because we are sealing the win there. they are making sure that although the clock is ticking down and we are on the other guys' 5 yard line, that they do the right things to close this out. the reason that is so critically important is that it is the first battle of this extended war against extremism. our philosophy has worked. the idea from the very beginning that we needed to insert a wedge between the extremists and the moderates in the country showed itself, in 2006, when the sunnis out in anbar rose up and said, we have seen these guys. we know what they ha

but the longer we wait to leave kuwait the better chance. >> host: the final two questions i'm going to create the freakonomics at riss corner of you don't mind. two issues, one sort of small and one quite large. a fascinating chapter on the economics of prostitution. at much as it focuses on ally, a freakonomics reader who got in touch with you and i guess we call it high prostitute, she makes a fair amount of money and things for her turn out pretty well. now she's out an economics course somewhere and so on. so my question is if the 18-year-old daughter of a friend called you at some time considering following her example what advice would you have for her? >> guest: i don't want my daughter to be a prostitute. but i think its -- i think that it is a quintessential weakness of societal dialogue when we can't appreciate our preferences are not other people's preferences. even if the number of women who would want to lead the life that ally leaves is one in 100,000, and even though it is illegal, it doesn't mean that people like us can't look at this case and try to write about it a

intervene on the behalf of muslims and bosnia and kosovo and somalia when there was a famine and kuwait it was occupied by saddam hussein's forces. and then there was the earthquake and pakistan, the tidal wave and the rescue effort after that in indonesia. certainly the united states was viewed favorably by those people that benefited from that. so to throw back at you in that sense, is it too narrow to judge united states only by the worst things that happened or only by the best things that happened, or is there some way to take all the elements into account? >> that is why i say it is confusing when it comes to the middle east in the arab world and the muslims. if you go back to the early 1950's, you find that the united states was split on the issue of recognition of the state of israel. the state department was opposed. president truman was basically advocating a state. until 1956, we did not support the state of israel. we're opposed even supporting it through arms or enter into any kind of negotiations or treaties with israel. with john f. kennedy, we had problems with the state

in which both saudi arabia and kuwait are leading shareholders, who have relationships with our country. this is unfortunate. this propaganda threatens the long-term u.s. interests in the region and does a great deal of damage to the prospects of improving the bilateral relations between america and our allies in the arab world. in addition, it undermines the prospects for arab-israeli peace, make no doubt about that. americans have witnessed this direct connection between the charged rhetoric of the jihadist narrative. as tom friedman called in his recent column that many of us have read. and incites actual violence. this incitement creates and environment conducive to and accepting of terrorism. terrorism that impacts all of us throughout the world. as the u.s. and other nations join in fighting this terrorism, there must be a renewed vigilance against the purveyors of anti-american hatred abroad and the consequences for inaction and inattention are state sponsorship of this hatred we know in terms of what the outcomes -- outcome's prospects are. this legislation requires the state de

when it is nimble and flexible, it generally is a bad contract because it happened to kuwait and nobodywas paying attention to what was in it and whether -- because of nobody was paying attention to what was in it and it happened too quickly. i think that -- i want to make sure that i understand what every silo is in terms of contract in money. -- contract in moneing money. now that i finally logcap finally -- i finally figured out logcap, use bring anyone with me. if you will all give us within your siloi of yourng money and -- what is in your silo with contracting and where it is, i believe we can get on the same page. we have a huge obligation to try to get this right. if you will get that to me, that will be great and we will begin to drill down in those various places and make sure that the on the ground oversight -- and the other thing that we would like from you is that if you believe you have enough oversight personnel in place in theater, and if not, what you need to get the -- enough people in oversight in theater. i will say this, and i do not mean to embarrass her or mr. nor

this conlum says, quote, we ran saddam out of kuwait and put u.s. troops in saudi arabia and got osama bin laden's 9/11. we responded by taking down the taliban and taking over afghanistan. and we got an eight-year war with no victory and no end in sight. now pakistan is burning. we took down saddam and got a seven-year war and ungrateful iraq. meanwhile, the turks who share the border with saddam have done no fighting. iran has watched as we destroyed its two greatest enemies, the taliban and saddam. china, which has a border with both pakistan and afghanistan, has set back. india, which has a border with pakistan and fought three wars with the country has stayed aloof. the united states on the other side of the world plunged in. and now we face an elongated military pressence in iraq. an escalating war in afghanistan, and potential disaster in pakistan and being pushed from behind into a war with iran. and then in the december 3 issue of the "washington post," it says this, it says president obama's new strategy for combating swlamic insurgents in

behalf of muslims in bosnia, on behalf of muslims in kosovo, in somalia when there was a famine, in kuwaits forces. and then of course there was the earthquake in pakistan and the tidal wave and post rescue effort in indonesia. certainly the united states was viewed favorably by the people who benefited from that. so to kind of throw back at you in that sense, is it too narrow to judge the united states only by the worst things that have happened or only by the best things that have happened, or should there be some way of taking all these elements into account? >> that is why i said it was rather confusing. to the muslim it is confusing. if you go back to the early 1950's, we find that the united states was split on the issue of recognition of the state of israel, offense. the state department was opposed, and president truman was basically advocating the recognition of the state. until 1956 we did not support the state of israel. we were basically opposed of supporting it through arms. we did not enter into any kind of treaty with the state of israel. so it was confusion in that politica

american military has been at with war or had forces deployed continuously since saddam hussein invaded kuwaitn august of 1990. for the past eight years we have fought terrorists and insurgents in afghanistan and iraq. the forces have been tested during this period as never before. but it has also performed as never before. it is without question the finest fighting force and in particular the fighting counter insurgency force our nation has ever fielded. the determination, skill, initiative and courage of our soldiers, sailers, airmen, marine and coast guardsmen are awe inspiring. so are the sack faces they and their families make every day. it continues to be the greatest of privileges to serve with them and with our civilian and coalition partners in such important important missions we are taking. i want to thank you and your colleagued for the continuous support you provide for our men and women in uniform and their civilian partners. >> thank you very much, general. >> thank you for the opportunity to present my views on afghanistan today. i would like to ask that my full statement be su

but when he invades kuwait.there's enough of it that gorbachev picks up on it and in conversations with baker, she says, you know, well the decision is a relic phase where he tried to come up with structural to post-cold war europe. you've come up with this common european home and it's not really working and he says to baker you guys had the g-7 and the ec 12 and the m-16. how about we have an e. seven and a bridge organization. and baker says that's not really going to work in gorbachev says went away but russia and nato. the soviet union, i'm sorry. the soviet union nato and baker says while that's a fantasy. let's take an world of reality. in gorbachev keeps saying why do we think about this. so it comes up, but it's never really, it's never taken seriously in the west. and baker later then says to the public. you know, if russia embraces democracy and free-market we should include it. so that's an interesting open question. and where he finally came down in the book is i don't, i finally come down on nato e

afghanistan where everything has to be imported it is much more difficult than it was in iraq where we had kuwait as a staging ground to go into iraq. you offloading ship in karachi and by the time whatever it is, muffins for soldiers breakfast couric inside ied equipment it gets to where we are headed, it goes through lot hands and one of the major sources of funding for the taliban is the protection money. that does nothing to do with president karzai so i think we owe you a more careful and pecking of a lot of the concerns and we will endeavor to provide that. >> i appreciate that. >> senator webb. >> thank you mr. chairman. i would like to welcome all three of you again after a brief exchange yesterday. it has been interesting to hear how different committees approach the same situation. welcome to the formulations committee. it like to say first of all i think we have pretty broad agreement about the concerns that were facing in afghanistan, even among members who have been pretty vocal here today. the question really is to continue to examine the process that we are proposing in order to ad

what about -- in 1990, bush number one was sending -- was getting ready to send troops in kuwait.ow do you budget for those things? and so all of a sudden that fiscal dividend gets eaten up pretty damn quickly as we go forward here. >> what bill is raising here is a really important point which is the incredible abuse of the emergency provision. [laughter] >> and actually obama and bush are tied at this point. >> good. >> having both put through $880 billion worth of emergency supplementals. bush -- i mean, think of how different the concept of emergency from congress -- to me an emergency is something you can't expect and, therefore, can't budget for in advance. like a forest fire, like a katrina. well, the entire seven years' war and going is being paid for as an emergency exclusion. and so there are ways to deal with that that we could talk about, you know, what i think. >> let me ask larry and frances on something bill you said earlier. you suggested -- you pointed out that in the 1990s it was a crisis, a crisis of government. that enabled you to reach some kind of an agreemen

likewise, the world recognized the need to confront saddam hussein when he invaded kuwait -- a consensusion. furthermore, america -- in fact, no nation -- can insist that others follow the rules of the road if we refuse to follow them ourselves. for when we don't, our actions appear arbitrary and undercut the legitimacy of future interventions, no matter how justified. important when the purpose of military action extends beyond self-defense or the defense of one nation against an aggressor. more and more, we all confront difficult questions about how to prevent the slaughter of civilians by their own government, or to stop a civil war whose violence and suffering can engulf an entire region. i believe that force can be justified on humanitarian grounds, as it was in the balkans, or in other places that have been scarred by war. inaction tears at our conscience and can lead to more costly intervention later. that's why all responsible nations must embrace the role that militaries with a clear mandate can play to keep the peace. america's commitment to global security will never waver. bu

american military has been at with war or had forces deployed continuously since saddam hussein invaded kuwait in august of 1990. for the past eight years we have fought terrorists and insurgents in afghanistan and iraq. the forces have been tested during this period as never before. but it has also performed as never before. it is without question the finest fighting force and in particular the fighting counter insurgency force our nation has ever fielded. the determination, skill, initiative and courage of our soldiers, sailers, airmen, marine and coast guardsmen are awe inspiring. so are the sack faces they and their families make every day. it continues to be the greatest of privileges to serve with them and with our civilian and coalition partners in such important important missions we are taking. i want to thank you and your colleagued for the continuous support you provide for our men and women in uniform and their civilian partners. >> thank you very much, general. >> thank you for the opportunity to present my views on afghanistan today. i would like to ask that my full statement be

american military has been at with war or had forces deployed continuously since saddam hussein invaded kuwaitn august of 1990. for the past eight years we have fought terrorists and insurgents in afghanistan and iraq. the forces have been tested during this period as never before. but it has also performed as never before. it is without question the finest fighting force and in particular the fighting counter insurgency force our nation has ever fielded. the determination, skill, initiative and courage of our soldiers, sailers, airmen, marine and coast guardsmen are awe inspiring. so are the sack faces they and their families make every day. it continues to be the greatest of privileges to serve with them and with our civilian and coalition partners in such important important missions we are taking. i want to thank you and your colleagued for the continuous support you provide for our men and women in uniform and their civilian partners. >> thank you very much, general. >> thank you for the opportunity to present my views on afghanistan today. i would like to ask that my full statement be su

before joining the senate, first sergeant simmons served in kuwait with the 3rd assault amphibian battalion. he also participated in the initial attack and continuing operations in iraq. his heroic senate as a section leader during that time earned him the navy and marine corps commendation metal and a combat distinguishing device for valor. first sergeant simmons' strength, dedication and firsthand experience overseas made him an invaluable resource for my staff and our nation's service members and veterans. understanding of the difficult transition for returning service members and veterans, first sergeant simmons reached out to help them and their families in tangible ways. from helping ohio veterans with their v.a. claims to assisting a wounded service member during rehabilitation to meeting and speaking with families whose loved ones are overseas, first sergeant simmons demonstrated an unequivocal commitment to his fellow service members. his tireless work on the vision scholars act of 2009 will help ensure that veterans suffering from eye injuries would not also suffer from the curren

and i've been to bosnia when we were in bosnia, kosovo, then iraq, afghanistan, kuwait, where we haveo many troops who are supporsupporting our troops in , and also now supporting our troops with equipment transfers into afghanistan. and those troops are not going to be with their families this christmas, and so we will pass this bill. we will support our troops. we will follow in the great tradition of the united states senate and this will be a very bipartisan vote. i also want to mention in the time that we have left that the major issue that we must face before we -- we finish here in the christmas holidays and then hopefully go on into next year is the health care reform bill that is before us, and this is of great concern to me because i don't think we ought to rush the health care reform bill. the health care that affects every family, every person in our country is a quality-of-life issue. and america has had the great tradition and now expectation that we will have the best health care in the world, that we will have a doctor and a patient relationship that determines what tr

evacuating our stuff both through kuwait and jordan as well. a lot of it's going to afghanistan. we've got some issues these days with equipment sets, but in any event, a lot of the things that are coming out of iraq are getting a very rapid rehab in theater and are making their way to afghanistan to be able to support the additional troop requirements that will be there. what i told the troops in iraq, is that the most dangerous thing that our core is doing today is happening in afghanistan. the most important thing we're doing today is happening in iraq. and that is because we are sealing the win to there. they are making sure that although the clock is ticking down and we are on the other guy's 5-yard line, and they do the right things to close this out. the reason that we think it's so critically important that we do so is that it's the first battle of this extended war against extremism and. our philosophy has worked here for the idea from the very beginning that we needed to insert a wedge between the extremists and the moderates in the country showed itself in 2006. when t