mom's ethel merman. >> [ riedel laughs ] >> i thought, "i can do that."ght, we were at "gypsy." and afterwards, 'miss merman' to me, then, took us to sardi's. >> riedel: of course. >> and i met -- an 18-year-old, you know, theater enthusiast, meeting all of show business heaven -- it was terrific. and then billy rose, the great producer, drove us home in his, uh...rolls-royce. >> riedel: [laughs] not bad. >> but on the way home -- 'cause we dropped the two ethels off at the park lane hotel -- >> we should say that ethel's daughter was "little ethel." >> little ethel. >> riedel: she named her daughter after herself. >> first there was ethel agnes zimmerman, her mother. became ethel merman. and then ethel merman levitt, her daughter. >> riedel: anyway, you were saying -- >> mr. rose was driving -- we dropped them off, and he was driving me up to 79th and park, and the most wonderful thing of it was that he was on in years, especially compared to me, and he was talking to me like -- as he would a peer. and he said, you know, that he had known the real mama r

mom's ethel merman. >> [ riedel laughs ] >> i thought, "i can do that."ght, we were at "gypsy." and afterwards, 'miss merman' to me, then, took us to sardi's. >> riedel: of course. >> and i met -- an 18-year-old, you know, theater enthusiast, meeting all of show business heaven -- it was terrific. and then billy rose, the great producer, drove us home in his, uh...rolls-royce. >> riedel: [laughs] not bad. >> but on the way home -- 'cause we dropped the two ethels off at the park lane hotel -- >> we should say that ethel's daughter was "little ethel." >> little ethel. >> riedel: she named her daughter after herself. >> first there was ethel agnes zimmerman, her mother. became ethel merman. and then ethel merman levitt, her daughter. >> riedel: anyway, you were saying -- >> mr. rose was driving -- we dropped them off, and he was driving me up to 79th and park, anthe most wonderful thing of it was that he was on in years, especially compared to me, and he was talking to me like -- as he would a peer. and he said, you know, that he had known the real mama ros

i'm joined today by bruce riedel, who i am sure most of you know bruce was a 50 year veteran of the intelligence community in the u.s. government before joining brookings about a half a dozen years ago. he was an expert on counterterrorism and an expert on south asia as well as much on the middle east and his latest book is avoiding armageddon and about the u.s.-india pakistan history and relationship over the years but he's also been a great deal of work on the counterterrorism and certainly on al qaeda and that is one of the issues here today. next to him is michael duran during the bush administration and writing a book now on historical background in the middle east that president eisenhower specifically has written a great deal about syria and has had this house one of his big areas of expertise and focus now for a decade or longer. those of you that followed twitter and follow the pages in general will certainly have seen a great deal of his work. next to him is jeremy shapiro back as a visiting scholar after having spent a number of years in the u.s. government and specifically the obama