[House Hearing, 114 Congress]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office]
[H.A.S.C. No. 114-139]
15 YEARS AFTER 9/11: THE STATE OF THE FIGHT AGAINST ISLAMIC TERRORISM
__________
COMMITTEE ON ARMED SERVICES
HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES
ONE HUNDRED FOURTEENTH CONGRESS
SECOND SESSION
__________
HEARING HELD
SEPTEMBER 21, 2016
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COMMITTEE ON ARMED SERVICES
One Hundred Fourteenth Congress
WILLIAM M. ``MAC'' THORNBERRY, Texas, Chairman
WALTER B. JONES, North Carolina ADAM SMITH, Washington
J. RANDY FORBES, Virginia LORETTA SANCHEZ, California
JEFF MILLER, Florida ROBERT A. BRADY, Pennsylvania
JOE WILSON, South Carolina SUSAN A. DAVIS, California
FRANK A. LoBIONDO, New Jersey JAMES R. LANGEVIN, Rhode Island
ROB BISHOP, Utah RICK LARSEN, Washington
MICHAEL R. TURNER, Ohio JIM COOPER, Tennessee
JOHN KLINE, Minnesota MADELEINE Z. BORDALLO, Guam
MIKE ROGERS, Alabama JOE COURTNEY, Connecticut
TRENT FRANKS, Arizona NIKI TSONGAS, Massachusetts
BILL SHUSTER, Pennsylvania JOHN GARAMENDI, California
K. MICHAEL CONAWAY, Texas HENRY C. ``HANK'' JOHNSON, Jr.,
DOUG LAMBORN, Colorado Georgia
ROBERT J. WITTMAN, Virginia JACKIE SPEIER, California
DUNCAN HUNTER, California TAMMY DUCKWORTH, Illinois
JOHN FLEMING, Louisiana SCOTT H. PETERS, California
MIKE COFFMAN, Colorado MARC A. VEASEY, Texas
CHRISTOPHER P. GIBSON, New York TULSI GABBARD, Hawaii
VICKY HARTZLER, Missouri TIMOTHY J. WALZ, Minnesota
JOSEPH J. HECK, Nevada BETO O'ROURKE, Texas
AUSTIN SCOTT, Georgia DONALD NORCROSS, New Jersey
MO BROOKS, Alabama RUBEN GALLEGO, Arizona
RICHARD B. NUGENT, Florida GWEN GRAHAM, Florida
PAUL COOK, California BRAD ASHFORD, Nebraska
JIM BRIDENSTINE, Oklahoma SETH MOULTON, Massachusetts
BRAD R. WENSTRUP, Ohio PETE AGUILAR, California
JACKIE WALORSKI, Indiana (Vacancy)
BRADLEY BYRNE, Alabama (Vacancy)
SAM GRAVES, Missouri
RYAN K. ZINKE, Montana
ELISE M. STEFANIK, New York
MARTHA McSALLY, Arizona
STEPHEN KNIGHT, California
THOMAS MacARTHUR, New Jersey
STEVE RUSSELL, Oklahoma
Robert L. Simmons II, Staff Director
Alex Gallo, Professional Staff Member
William S. Johnson, Counsel
Britton Burkett, Clerk
C O N T E N T S
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Page
STATEMENTS PRESENTED BY MEMBERS OF CONGRESS
Smith, Hon. Adam, a Representative from Washington, Ranking
Member, Committee on Armed Services............................ 2
Thornberry, Hon. William M. ``Mac,'' a Representative from Texas,
Chairman, Committee on Armed Services.......................... 1
WITNESSES
Jenkins, Brian Michael, Senior Advisor to the President of RAND
Corporation.................................................... 5
Jeffrey, Hon. James, Former U.S. Ambassador to Turkey and Iraq... 3
Price, LTC Bryan C., USA, Ph.D., Counterterrorism Expert......... 7
APPENDIX
Prepared Statements:
Jenkins, Brian Michael....................................... 49
Jeffrey, Hon. James.......................................... 39
Price, LTC Bryan C........................................... 63
Documents Submitted for the Record:
[There were no Documents submitted.]
Witness Responses to Questions Asked During the Hearing:
[There were no Questions submitted during the hearing.]
Questions Submitted by Members Post Hearing:
Mr. Langevin................................................. 83
15 YEARS AFTER 9/11: THE STATE OF THE FIGHT AGAINST ISLAMIC TERRORISM
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House of Representatives,
Committee on Armed Services,
Washington, DC, Wednesday, September 21, 2016.
The committee met, pursuant to call, at 10:02 a.m., in room
2118, Rayburn House Office Building, Hon. William M. ``Mac''
Thornberry (chairman of the committee) presiding.
OPENING STATEMENT OF HON. WILLIAM M. ``MAC'' THORNBERRY, A
REPRESENTATIVE FROM TEXAS, CHAIRMAN, COMMITTEE ON ARMED
SERVICES
The Chairman. This meeting will come to order. Today the
committee meets to consider ``15 Years After 9/11: The State of
the Fight Against Islamic Terrorism.''
All of us marked the 15th anniversary last week of the
attacks of 9/11. That was an opportunity to remember and honor
the victims of those attacks. It was also an opportunity to
remember and honor all of those who have sacrificed to prevent
a recurrence of 9/11.
But it gives us, I think, not only an opportunity but an
obligation to look back on these 15 years and look at the state
of the fight against terrorists, what has worked, what hasn't.
How is the threat changing? Are we adaptable to meet the change
of the threat?
My view is that the people in the military, the
intelligence community, and law enforcement have done an
incredible job to prevent another successful attack on the
scale of 9/11. But the rest of the story is we have been lucky.
Some of the bombs just didn't go off because they weren't
constructed appropriately.
Just the events of the past few days remind us how this
threat is changing and how difficult it is to detect it and
prevent it as well. In my view, we still have not dealt
effectively with some of the root causes. We have not
effectively dealt with the ideology that radicalizes people
here and around the world.
And it is essential, moving forward, that we not just try
to muddle through, contain, try to prevent a catastrophe, but
that we have a strategy that will be successful in dealing with
the threat as it is evolving.
As you all know, ISIS [Islamic State of Iraq and Syria]
says even if it loses its physical caliphate, it will pursue a
virtual caliphate. One of the questions for us, are we ready to
deal militarily and otherwise with a virtual caliphate?
So we face, I think, a number of serious challenges in our
responsibility to keep the American people safe. We have some
outstanding witnesses to help guide us through those
challenges. But first I will turn to the ranking member for any
comments he would like to make.
STATEMENT OF HON. ADAM SMITH, A REPRESENTATIVE FROM WASHINGTON,
RANKING MEMBER, COMMITTEE ON ARMED SERVICES
Mr. Smith. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. And I think this is a
very appropriate hearing to gauge 15 years later where are we
at in fighting the groups that attacked us on 9/11 and the
ideology that is behind it. And I think the chairman laid out
fairly well the challenges that we face post-9/11.
We took a very clear look at it. We had a clear group of
folks in Al Qaeda that were challenging us. And we went after
that network. And then I think we went after that network
fairly effectively.
And I think it was General McChrystal at the time who said,
``It takes a network to defeat a network.'' And we pulled
together all the different elements of U.S. power, and our
allies, with the intelligence, law enforcement, military and
built a very sophisticated operations center and tracked this
group, first, of course, in Afghanistan, and then into Pakistan
and Yemen and elsewhere and have done a successful job of
taking out their leadership and then minimizing their ability
to move forward.
What we have not been successful at is turning back the
ideology. And that is where other groups have popped up. And,
you know, whether it is Al Qaeda or ISIL [Islamic State of Iraq
and the Levant] or Ansar al-Sharia, or any of, you know, Boko
Haram, you know, dozens of different groups that adhere to this
nihilistic, violent death ideology. That ideology has, quite
honestly, spread since 9/11. There are more people adhering to
it now than there were then.
And that is the great threat. And that is what we have seen
in Europe and here as people not directly affiliated with Al
Qaeda or ISIL or any of these other groups, but simply pledging
allegiance and going off and committing violent acts in their
name.
Now in some cases these are people who have bought into the
ideology, but even more frightening, it now seems like this
ideology is the last refuge for every sort of violent loser and
loner in the world. Some of these folks, you go through their
history, they haven't had much of a connection to this. They
just wanted to act out and use this as an excuse to commit
violent acts and threaten the lives of others.
So I think the most interesting question for this hearing
is, how do we turn back that ideology? And this is particularly
important for our work with the Muslim world on how do we
promote the more peaceful brand of Islam that the overwhelming
majority of people in that religion adhere to and work with
them to defeat the ideology?
And the last thing I will say is I think that is a
challenge because this is what Osama bin Laden wanted. He
wanted a war of civilizations. He wanted the West versus Islam.
And every time we take a look at this and, you know, cast a
broad net and cast aspersions against the entire Islamic
religion, we only empower Al Qaeda and ISIL and their message.
We have to find a way to work with our friends in the
Muslim world both at home and abroad, to confront this ideology
and turn it back.
And, yes, I think we have to continue the military aspect
of it as well. If there are specific groups plotting and
planning against us we need to know about them and stop them
from carrying out those threats. But that is but one piece.
The larger, and more difficult piece, and what I want to
hear about is, you know, what is our strategy for rendering the
ideology neutral? Ultimately that is what won the Cold War for
us, is we proved that communism was a failed ideology. And not
only did the Soviet Union collapse, but with the exception of a
couple of isolated places in the world, communism collapsed.
The entire idea behind it collapsed.
And before we are successful in this struggle, the ideology
that Al Qaeda and others have advanced is what we are going to
have to defeat and what is ultimately going to have to
collapse. And I don't personally have any easy answers for
that. Certainly, I know some things we should be doing, but I
look forward to hearing more about how we can approach that.
And with that I would yield back. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
The Chairman. Let me welcome each of our witnesses. We
appreciate you all being with us and the insights that you will
deliver.
We are pleased to welcome Honorable James Jeffrey, who has
been U.S. Ambassador to both Turkey and Iraq; Brian Jenkins,
senior advisor to the president of RAND, a frequent witness
over the years on these topics; and Lieutenant Colonel Dr.
Bryan Price, who happens to be the director of the Combating
Terrorism Center at West Point. But he is not here representing
the Combating Terrorism Center or the Army. He is here only in
his personal capacity as an academic and terrorism expert.
So we again thank you all for being here. Without
objection, your full written statements will made be part of
the record.
Ambassador Jeffrey, we are pleased to recognize you for any
comments you would like to make.
STATEMENT OF HON. JAMES JEFFREY, FORMER U.S. AMBASSADOR TO
TURKEY AND IRAQ
Ambassador Jeffrey. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, Mr. Ranking
Member. Thank you very much for holding this hearing on the
15th anniversary, particularly given the events, as you
mentioned, in the last week. The fight against Islamic
terrorism in its various manifestations is both a key element
of our national security and a central component in the effort
to stabilize the larger Middle East.
I would like to touch briefly on where we are and, in
response to your questions, where we may be going on this
campaign in a very broad brush. This and the last
administration's combination of playing defense, protecting the
homeland, and going on the offense, both with military action
and in the effort to deal with the political roots and
psychological and cultural and religious roots of terror, all
in all is a good model, and we should stick with it.
Nonetheless, as you have just indicated, there are problems
with what we have done up to now in our success so far.
Homeland defense, all in all, high marks. On military action,
directly and with partners, the record is mixed.
The U.S. was slow countering ISIS's rise, and we didn't
react as quickly to events in Syria that have led to a major
increase both in ISIS as a terrorist threat and in the
underlying dysfunctionality of the region that feeds terror of
all sorts, including terror supported by Iran, which is a major
factor that I will touch on in a second.
In terms of the root causes of terrorism, as the ranking
member said, this is not something that we can do directly.
This is something the region has to do itself. And if we try
too hard to do it, it tends to be counterproductive, as someone
who spent 20 years in the region. But there is much that we can
do, and that is what I would like to talk about right now.
First of all, this is going to take a lot of time. As we
all know, we are already 15 years into it, and the roots of
this problem stretch back decades before 2001. The military
element, while it cannot solve this problem, is critical, both
in defending ourselves, limiting the expansion of terror, and
stopping the creation of new ungoverned zones.
You create an ungoverned zone by one or another breakdown
of order in the Middle East, and we have more than a half a
dozen right now. You will get ISIS, Al Qaeda, or other
terrorist groups, from Hezbollah in southern Lebanon, to the
Sinai, to Gaza, to the Fatah of Afghanistan, Somalia, Libya, on
and on. These are breeding grounds for a huge threat, not just
to us from terror, but to the basic structure of the region.
Now military operations, this committee and the American
people have discussed a lot over the past 15 years. They don't
have to be large-scale, costly or high casualty, but we have to
thread the needle.
If we try to transform the region, and to some degree we
tried to do that in the last administration and in this
administration with the surge in Afghanistan and with Libya, we
tend to go too far, overshoot the objective, and it doesn't
work out. On the other hand, when we pull ourselves back and
don't respond, as I said, as we did initially with ISIS, as we
have done in Syria, we see the problem just morphs. The problem
just metastasizes without American presence.
So you have to thread that needle. Enough military force,
but not too much to challenge the American people's patience
and sensitivities in the region.
Those sensitivities are important if we are going to work
with folks in the region and, in the end, they are responsible
for the kind of cultures they have, the truces they have among
themselves, and how they deal with the rest of the world,
including us and Europe.
There is a lot of work to be done. We can help, but only on
the margins. But there are a few things we need to keep in
mind. First of all, only a few people in the Middle East really
endorse this kind of extreme terrorist violence.
A much larger percent of the population, however, accept
views of Islam that are orthodox, that are quite strong, that
include Sharia and basically challenge modernity in some ways.
So that means that the path we are on is very thin. We have to
be sensitive. Sensitivity can go too far.
One of the things I am concerned about is we seem to avoid
speaking publicly of this threat as an Islamic terrorist
threat. It is an Islamic terrorist threat. I am very, very
sensitive to not generalizing, as the ranking member said, but
if we try to hide this, people in the region, Muslims know what
is behind this.
They know this is struggle for the region. And to play this
down, frankly, doesn't play very well in our own population or
in a population in Europe. And it is very important to keep
those people behind us.
We have to support the governments of the region,
recognizing that often they are going to be imperfect partners.
But it is not just that they are partners we have. They are the
only basis we can use to work against terror, but also partners
throughout the region are watching how we deal with an Egypt,
how we deal with an Iraq, how we deal with the leadership,
again, however imperfect they are. We have to not only say what
we are against, but what we are for.
The United States stands, since 100 years, for an
international order based on certain laws, national
sovereignty, national unity, peaceful resolution of disputes,
and the sanctity of borders. That is an important message also
in the Middle East, because all of these are being challenged
by movements close to or supporting terror.
Finally, our campaign must also focus on Iran. Iran simply
is not an acceptable partner in the war against terror, despite
a recent article published in the United States by the Iranian
Foreign Minister Zarif to that end.
The theocratic Iranian regime's Islamic roots have much in
common with Sunni Islamic extremism. It uses terror itself,
including here in Washington. It has relations with Al Qaeda
and Taliban elements, and undercuts international order and
sovereignty, and thus provides a breeding ground for terror of
all sorts.
But in particular, and we saw this in Iraq repeatedly,
regional states generally view Iran as a greater existential
threat than Sunni Islamic terror. There is thus a real danger
that if the Sunni-Shia conflict now seen in Syria emerges
region-wide, our Sunni partners could see violent Sunni Islamic
movements, not as threats, but as allies against Iran.
Mr. Chairman, I will stop there. Thank you.
[The prepared statement of Ambassador Jeffrey can be found
in the Appendix on page 39.]
The Chairman. Thank you, sir.
Mr. Jenkins.
STATEMENT OF BRIAN MICHAEL JENKINS, SENIOR ADVISOR TO THE
PRESIDENT OF RAND CORPORATION
Mr. Jenkins. Chairman Thornberry, Ranking Member Smith,
members of the committee, thank you very much for inviting me
to address this important issue. Fifteen years of U.S. efforts
to destroy the jihadist terrorist enterprise have not led to
victory in the classic military sense. Such victory may not be
achievable in this kind of war.
Instead, our counterterrorist efforts have achieved
successes in some areas, far less so in others, in what is
likely to be an enduring task. On the plus side, our worst
fears, as you pointed out, have not been realized. There have
been no more 9/11s, and none of the worst-case scenarios that
post-9/11 extrapolations suggested.
The operational capabilities of Al Qaeda and ISIL remain
limited. The vast majority of Muslims express negative views
toward both jihadist organizations, but even a very low
percentage of favorable ratings still represents in actual
numbers a large reservoir of potential recruits.
The constellation of jihadist groups is less than it
appears to be on a map. To be sure, Al Qaeda and ISIL have
sought declarations of loyalty from local groups across Africa
and the Middle East and have established a host of affiliates,
provinces, and jihadist footholds.
This is growth by acquisition and branding. These partners
share a banner, but are focused, for the most part, on local
quarrels, rather than a global jihad. There is no central
command, no joint operations.
ISIL has lost territory and can be defeated as a quasi-
state. Al Qaeda's central command has been reduced to exhorting
others to fight. But these continuing calls on local
supporters, terrorist supporters in the West, to take action
have thus far, despite the occasional tragic event, have
produced only a modest response. However, right now, large
volumes of homegrown terrorists and returning foreign fighters
pose a significant threat to our allies in Europe.
In the United States, fortunately, the number of homegrown
terrorists remains far less. I believe that Americans are safer
now than they were on 9/11 in the 15 years since jihadist
terrorists.
Since 9/11, jihadist terrorists have been able to kill
fewer than 100 people in the United States. True, we have been
lucky, and while every death is a needless tragedy, this is a
far better result than certainly was feared or expected
immediately after 9/11.
On the minus side, the targets of the American-led
campaigns have survived intense U.S. counterterrorist efforts.
Al Qaeda and ISIL have been cornered, not crushed. And we can't
claim to have dented their determination. The jihadists have a
powerful ideology, as both of you have mentioned. It arouses
extreme devotion.
However, that ideology, which we have not yet effectively
countered, has, fortunately, gained little traction in most
Muslim communities, especially here in the United States.
Personal crisis is the dominant attribute of most American
jihadists. ISIL has made more effective use of social media to
reach a broader audience, but its advertisement of atrocity
makes it a magnet for marginal and psychologically disturbed
individuals.
The Taliban remains a formidable foe. The continued
deployment of U.S. forces will be necessary to prevent their
comeback. The fighting in Syria and Iraq will go on for the
foreseeable future. Foreign powers cannot impose peace from the
outside. Faced with the loss of territory, ISIL will not quit.
The leaders of ISIL fought clandestinely for years and will go
underground again to continue the struggle.
Syria and Iraq will remain fragile states, sources of
continued violence, regional instability. The current
partitions are likely to persist. The big problem is going to
be that the Sunni areas in both countries could become a
persistent badlands.
The world will be dealing with the effluents of these
conflicts for years to come. Thousands of foreign fighters who
have joined ISIL cannot survive in an underground campaign.
Indeed, the construction of the Islamic State could bring about
a spike in terrorist activity by its scattering veterans.
Refugees pose a long-term challenge. Those going to Europe
right now include a large proportion of single young men coming
from violent environments with little education. They already
are the targets of radicalization.
The primary threat to the United States will come from the
ability of Al Qaeda or ISIL to inspire attacks by self-
radicalized individuals here. The United States is now better
organized and equipped to combat terrorism, but America's
frightened, angry, and divided society remains the country's
biggest vulnerability. So after 15 years, there has been
progress, but we are not through it yet.
[The prepared statement of Mr. Jenkins can be found in the
Appendix on page 49.]
The Chairman. Thank you, sir.
Colonel Price.
STATEMENT OF LTC BRYAN C. PRICE, USA, PH.D., COUNTERTERRORISM
EXPERT
Colonel Price. Chairman Thornberry, Ranking Member Smith,
and members of the committee, I want to thank you for the
opportunity to testify today. I have been asked to reflect on
the state of our counterterrorism fight since 9/11 and provide
some lessons learned over the past 15 years.
As an Active Duty officer, my testimony is based on my
academic work and my personal and professional experiences. I
am here today in my personal capacity, and my testimony should
not be taken to represent the views of the United States
Military Academy, the Army, or the Department of Defense.
Congressional hearings like this allow us to reflect and
critically analyze where we are in this conflict. I can tell
you that our enemies are doing the same.
In my written testimony, I highlighted a 50-page, 2008
lessons-learned document, produced by the precursor
organization to the Islamic State, that shows our enemies are
in this for the long haul and are serious about learning from
their mistakes. My written testimony contains a list of our
many counterterrorism successes, as you just heard from my
fellow panelists, but I want to focus my oral testimony on
lessons learned for the future.
To begin, the threat has evolved and metastasized in ways
few could have predicted after 9/11. Today, the threat posed by
jihadist terrorism is more geographically diffuse,
decentralized, and unpredictable than it was on September 12th,
2001.
Nobody could have predicted that the greatest terrorist
threat to the United States 15 years later would not be Al
Qaeda, but its rival, the Islamic State, which now governs
territory inside two sovereign nations. This reality should
give us pause about the unpredictable nature of the threat and
the challenges we face in combating it.
So what is the best way to conceptualize this threat,
moving forward? Unsettling as it may be, one alternative is to
view this threat not as a war, but as a chronic disease like
cancer. In other words, it may be worth viewing the fight
against jihadism not as a national security threat that can be
solved, defeated, or vanquished, but as an inevitable fact of
modern life that can be managed and contained, but never fully
eliminated.
With that in mind, I offer a few lessons learned in preview
of counterterrorism efforts in the future. First, in my
opinion, I think we need to do more in articulating realistic
public expectations about the threat posed by terrorism and our
ability to combat it. It is impossible to stop all attacks in a
free and open society, and not every terrorist attack
represents a political failure, nor are they existential
threats to our national security.
These subtleties are often lost in the public discourse,
which leads to unwarranted fear, divisiveness, and knee-jerk
decision making. Unfortunately, ridding the world of every
jihadist is just as fanciful as ridding the world of every
criminal or racist. Acknowledging this is not a sign of
weakness. It is a sign of pragmatism.
Number two, decapitation tactics must be a part of a
broader strategy. Targeted strikes by unmanned aerial systems
are often the most lethal and precise methods that
counterterrorism officials can use without putting American
service men and women in danger. But they are not sufficient by
themselves to defeat highly capable groups like Al Qaeda and
the Islamic State.
On the positive side, I have done research in this, and my
research analyzing 207 groups from 1970 to 2008 showed that
killing or capturing the top leader significantly increased the
mortality rate of terrorist groups. But timing matters.
Decapitate a group in the first year of its existence, and
it is more than eight times more likely to end than groups that
have not been decapitated. The effect is halved in 10 years and
potentially nonexistent after 20 years. Decapitating strikes
are not a silver bullet solution. They must be a part of a
broader strategy.
Three, we should acknowledge that the military will be a
critical part of any effective CT [counterterrorism] strategy
moving forward, but it is only one part, and it may not be the
most important part for long-term success.
I have had the privilege of briefing many of our Nation's
top counterterrorism officials over the past 4 years, and in
these engagements there has been one common refrain. We cannot
kill or capture our way to victory. Our military is the best in
the world at taking out terrorists, but long-term success in
this conflict lies in altering the sociopolitical dynamics in
the region. Otherwise, this conflict will be without end.
Four, future CT strategy should do more to leverage public-
private partnerships in the war of ideas. Lamenting on the slow
progress that the U.S. was making in this domain, the late
Richard Holbrooke once asked, ``How can a man in a cave,''
meaning Osama bin Laden, ``out-communicate the world's leading
communication society?''
Our difficulty in this domain stems from two inescapable
challenges. The first is overcoming the credibility gap that
the United States has in strategically communicating these
issues. Simply put, prospective jihadists do not turn to the
U.S. Government for career advice.
The second is that government bureaucracy invariably
produces a slower, more risk-averse and uninspiring approach to
counter-messaging that does not incentivize creativity,
experimentation, or risk-taking. One fix for this is more
public-private collaboration.
The government is incentivized to fund such programs, but
it does not have the credibility to be the primary messenger,
and it lacks the latest marketing and advertising capabilities.
Whereas the private sector, to include nongovernmental
organizations, often has the credibility and the requisite
competencies to deliver the message, but it is not financially
incentivized to do so.
Last, in my opinion, we need to find more systematic and
dedicated means of understanding our enemy and exposing their
hypocrisy to the world. The best way to do this is use their
own words against them.
These functions can be accomplished with more aggressive
efforts to declassify captured battlefield documents after they
have already been exploited for their tactical and operational
value and made available to academic institutions like the
Combating Terrorism Center at West Point.
Thank you for this opportunity to testify. I look forward
to answering your questions.
[The prepared statement of Colonel Price can be found in
the Appendix on page 63.]
The Chairman. Thank you. A lot of things I would like to
follow up on, but let me just backtrack for a second. You have
all touched on this, but I will just ask directly.
Looking back at the first 15 years, what is the most
significant way that the terrorist threat to us has changed,
looking back 15 years? Looking ahead 15 years, what do you
think the most significant change in the terrorist threat to us
will be? And then the third part of that is are we prepared to
deal with that change you see coming?
So what is the most significant way it has changed in the
past 15 years, the biggest way it will change in the next 15,
and are we ready for that change, I guess.
Ambassador.
Ambassador Jeffrey. Tough questions, Mr. Chairman. I would
say, over the past 15 years, the thing that is most significant
is terrorist movements have been able to exploit the changes
and the challenges of the broader Middle East very effectively.
A good example, and the best example perhaps, is the Arab
Spring. That wasn't generated by radicals, let alone
terrorists, but basically people who wanted a better
civilization, and in many respects closer to the West, thus
seemingly a good idea.
The result has been, in Syria, parts of Egypt, Libya, and
Yemen, and on the margins in other countries, a decrease of
state authority. And who fills the gap? Terrorist groups. Their
ability to exploit this underlying set of malignancies in this
region is extraordinary.
And I think that is the lesson at the strategic level I
take from this, 1,001 things that work and things that don't.
But now getting to the second question, what will happen, the
risk is not that this will just continue, because believe me it
will. The risk is that they hit a home run. We almost saw that
with ISIS, as it consumed a third of Syria and a third of Iraq
in 2014 and didn't look like it was going to be stopped.
We can't have one or two more of those without bringing the
whole region into a strudel of chaos and dysfunctionality, and
then it will really morph in ways that we can't imagine at this
point. How do we deal with this?
Again, what the three of us have said. You can't directly
deal with the core sociological, religious roots of it, but you
can deal with the manifestations of it. I would just advocate
you have to deal aggressively with it.
And one of the rare things here, I would disagree a bit
with Colonel Price, although I think I was saying almost the
same thing as him, but I would be careful about this idea of
the goal of containing ISIS or other terrorist movements. In
the end, that is what we are going to accomplish.
But if we set out to contain these movements, they will
beat us. If we set out carefully to destroy them, we will
probably succeed in containing them. And I think that the
history of our relationship with ISIS from January 2014 to late
2015 is a good illustration of that.
So we need more aggressive action and willingness to take
risks, not only in our public message but in our military and
diplomatic activities. Thank you, sir.
The Chairman. Thank you.
Mr. Jenkins.
Mr. Jenkins. I think that the--a couple of significant
changes in the last 15 years. First of all, the adversary is
now broader, more diffuse, more complex. A lot of that, as
Ambassador Jeffrey has correctly pointed out in my view, is a
consequence of the so-called Arab Spring.
That itself is a symptom of a fundamental turmoil that is
going on in this region, and we have to deal with it. But we
are on the margins of being able to intervene to change things
fundamentally. We simply don't have the resources to do that.
The other thing that is clear in the last 15 years, is that
our adversary here has been the beneficiary of these events.
They would probably claim of the beneficiaries of God's will.
But they have proved to be extraordinarily adaptive, able to
morph to meet new circumstances. That is much more difficult
for us to do. We are reacting.
With regard to the next 15 years, first of all, I am glad
you said ``the next 15 years'' because I think we have to
realistically think of time horizons in those terms. This
turmoil that we see now is going to go on. I think the
ambassador is correct in underscoring that state authority in
this area has weakened.
That is clearly the case in Syria and Iraq where power on
the ground has shifted from national institutions to militias
that are under foreign or local, not central government,
control and rebel formations that challenge that.
That is happening completely across the region. In dealing
with that and accepting a long-term thing, I think we have to
be very, very careful about picking our tasks very, very
carefully.
I would agree with the ambassador that we have to destroy
the Islamic State, so long as that exists. Without any
illusions that the fight stops if we destroy the Islamic State,
it has to be, and I am going to sound like the ancient Senator
Cato on this, and furthermore, the Islamic State must be
destroyed, but it has to be. It continues to be a source of
propaganda, an attraction for these fighters.
And, in addition to destroying it, I think we really do
have to try to, for those that want to go down and make it
their final fight, we have to close that ring around them and
give them the opportunity to do so. Better to do it there than
to deal with tens of thousands of them scattered across the
globe.
In terms of our own actions going forward, there is not
going to be a single strategy that any of us can determine now
that events over the next 15 years won't oblige us to revise
and alter as new circumstances arise. That is the feature of a
long conflict.
But a couple of principles ought to continue, and that is,
since it is going to be long, whatever we do, we have to be
able to sustain it for a long time. So we have to be careful
not to overcommit.
At the same time, what we have learned again and again is
prematurely walking away from these things, whether it is in
Iraq or Yemen or Afghanistan, that just risks a comeback by the
adversaries that we have already successfully contained, so----
The Chairman. Okay, thank you.
Colonel Price.
Colonel Price. Mr. Chairman, in terms of answering those
questions, I agree they are all three tough questions. In terms
of what happened in the past, in the past 15 years and what has
changed, I guess first I should just mention that my discussion
of containment earlier does not make me think that we should
not go on the offensive and attack the Islamic State.
I guess my fear though is if we focus too much on defeating
the Islamic State, and if we are unable to do that, what does
that mean in terms of our counterterrorism credibility moving
forward. And even I would argue that if you killed every single
last member of the Islamic State, the ideology that is behind
them is not. It is just going to mean it is going to be other
groups that are going to enter the fray.
In terms of the structural conditions that have changed in
the past 15 years that I think are most important, I would echo
my panelist, Mr. Jenkins, when he talks about the geographical
diffusion.
September 12th the threat was largely contained to the
AfPak [Afghanistan-Pakistan] region and some other pockets.
Today it stretches from Western Africa all the way through the
Middle East, the Levant, South and Southeast Asia. And so that
is obviously a challenge for U.S. counterterrorism.
The second that has not been mentioned, but you mentioned
in your opening, sir, was the internet, the virtual caliphate,
if you will. I think that has really changed the jihadist
landscape over the past 15 years and is also one of the things
that I think presents the most challenges to us moving forward.
The other thing I would argue in terms of the next 15 years
that poses the greatest challenge is the exploitation of
jihadists to exploit lack of governance or governance issues in
places around the world. And so those two things have brought a
very broad tent. A lot of people are gravitating towards that
type of ideology.
How should we fix those or what are the most promising ways
to fix those moving forward? I think there is promise on the
internet side of the house, and I think this goes back to my
point earlier about public-private partnerships, and I know
that our government is already working with the private sector
to work around some of these issues.
I can tell you that jihadists, particularly online, are
very aware of the rules and limitations that they have in order
to not come on the radar. And they are also getting more adept
at communicating via the dark web.
And then final challenge is, and this has been echoed by
both Ambassador Jeffrey and Mr. Jenkins, but going back to the
issue of lack of governance in these places, I think the United
States has found it difficult and challenging in order to
affect governance in other places, particularly when some of
these countries are not as allied with us like others.
The Chairman. Mr. Smith.
Mr. Smith. Thank you, just two points I want to pursue. I
want to pursue the ideology piece of it, but before I get there
I think, you know, part of the problem, and Mr. Jenkins
mentioned, you know, we can't leave too soon from places like
Iraq and Afghanistan, but what I have sort of found, as we have
tried to do this, that sort of imposing an outcome with our
military might, whether it is in Afghanistan or Iraq or Libya
or Syria or wherever we try to do it, has not proven to be
terribly successful, in large part because of the credibility
issue that Colonel Price pointed out. You know, having a
Western army in a Muslim country, or a Western military in a
Muslim country just fuels the problem.
So I guess the first question would be how do we get out of
that trap? Because it seems like, you know, when you look at
the different countries involved, we stay too long, we get out
too soon. I mean, you can take our state of the three examples
of Libya, Syria, and Iraq.
In Iraq we went all-in. You know, we, you know, and we were
there for a long time and I know a lot of people say, well, we
got out too soon. You know, I think if we had been there in
those numbers for another 10 years, at the end of those 10
years people would have been saying we got out too soon.
So at some point, you know, like I said, Western military
might is not going to force the outcome we want. And I think
Iraq proved that even though some may disagree.
In Libya, we decided, okay, we will go in, we will take out
the leader but then we will have less of a footprint. We will
let the locals sort of decide with a little bit of help. That
didn't work out.
In Syria we said, gee, you know, for a long time, there is
really not much we can do here. Let's not make it worse and
let's stay out. So basically all three methods have ended in
failure. Libya, Syria, and Iraq to all varying degrees are not
where we want them to be in this ideological struggle. So how
do we handle that in terms of our presence?
And then the second question is how do we deal with that
ideology? How do we make the Muslim world move in the
direction? And there are some groups out there that embrace
modernity, that are willing to accept other religions, other
viewpoints while pursuing their own. Because that is the
ballgame, basically, is that there is not a reasonable
alternative right now in terms of governance and religion.
So that gives fertile ground for these, you know, crazy
ideologies to grow. So those are the two questions.
And then, Colonel Price, if you could start out, since you
sort of touched on those in your opening, what is the best
approach to handling that?
Colonel Price. Yes, sir. So on the first question, I think
the way we will have to move forward and what we have done
since 9/11 is realize that this is not a unilateral fight. And
that it is going to require multilateral efforts in order to
make the most effective CT policy.
That obviously entails a number of functions, building
partner capacity, security force assistance, and those types of
programs. But I don't think I have a good answer to, say, to
come back with the perception problem of having the U.S. in
those countries.
On the second one, how to deal with the ideology, this is
more difficult. And in your opening statement, sir, you
mentioned some parallels to the Cold War and communism and how
we were able to defeat that type of ideology.
So I think the major difference that we are talking about
here and the threats to the United States in the past century,
when we were defeating fascism and totalitarianism, we defeated
that largely on the battlefield. There was no mistake of who
was the victor in that fight.
When you want to talk about defeating the ideology of
communism, that was done via a mix of methods to include the
military, but I think a lot of people would say that our
economic system had a large part in debunking that. There is
not a lot of new nations popping up today trying to have a
communist economic system.
And so the difference here, though, is when you are talking
about jihadists, they do not perceive defeat the way other
ideologies do. And so when we defeat them on the battlefield,
the lesson that they learn is not that this is a failed
ideology. The lesson that they take back is that they were not
resolved enough, committed enough to the cause, and that they
see this as being a very long-term fight.
And the second dynamic which we can't get around of is the
fact that as long as the United States enjoys a significant
amount of power asymmetry over other states but also
specifically non-state actors, the United States will continue
to be a convenient foil for non-state actors and jihadists that
want to blame the United States for all their grievances. And
so that is why I am largely so pessimistic about the fight in
the long run.
Mr. Smith. Thanks.
Mr. Jenkins, earlier you had mentioned some of those
issues. Do you want to take a stab at that?
Mr. Jenkins. You know, I am not sure that being blamed for
the ills of the world is necessarily new territory for us. I
mean, the United States is blamed for the world's problems,
blamed for not solving the world's problems, and blamed when it
tries to solve the world problems. That comes with the status.
Second point is for those who are really committed to this
ideology, it would be nice to think we can bring them back in
an ideological struggle. I am somewhat skeptical of that. I
think for those who are truly committed this is a fight.
So, you know, and as Colonel Price correctly points out, I
don't know how many Nazis were left in Germany in terms of the
mindset at the end of World War II, but it lacked the military
capacity to inflict that on other nations, so it was defeated.
Insofar as these particular adversaries not accepting that
defeat, whether they accept it or not, what we want to do is
blunt their capacity to impose it on others.
With regard to the various models of U.S. intervention, I
don't think under any circumstances, however exquisite our
counterinsurgency strategies may be in terms of their
sensitivity to local populations, U.S. troops in a foreign
country killing local people is not going to be a winning
formula. It may be absolutely necessary at times to conduct
limited operations, but we want to avoid that as much as
possible.
First of all, it is difficult to sustain in terms of
American political support, but also we accumulate enemies
fairly quickly in trying to do that. So what this means is it
is going to be indirect methods, it is going to be working with
allies, and it is going to be working with local partners.
Now, that is an imperfect way of doing things. And these
coalitions and these things are going to be messy. But that is
preferable to sending in tens of thousands or hundreds of
thousands of American forces unless we are really prepared to
keep them in for the next half century and to bear the price of
doing that. And I am not even sure it would work then.
Mr. Smith. I was going to say, I don't think it would work
then either. I have taken up quite a bit of time.
I want to let others get in, so I am sure someone will ask
a question later on, Mr. Jeffrey. You can offer your comments
on that, but I want to let other members ask questions, so I
will yield my time.
The Chairman. Mr. Jones.
Mr. Jones. Mr. Chairman, thank you. And, Mr. Jenkins, I was
thinking about your comments. The fact is I am not an
isolationist, but I am a realist. We are $19.4 trillion in
debt. We continue to spend billions and billions of dollars in
Afghanistan. I don't know what we are getting out of that,
quite frankly, except from time to time a soldier will lose a
leg or get killed, and we keep doing it.
And I wonder, from you three experts, well, is China
concerned about jihadist? I don't think so. And here we are,
because of our foreign policy that I blame both parties for.
Bush taking out Saddam Hussein was a horrible mistake. Then
Obama going and taking out Gaddafi was another horrible
mistake.
So here we are, as I think one of you said, and I am going
to stop in just a second, you said that when we get trapped
into a situation--they are my words not yours--that we keep
doing the same thing. And all we are doing is enhancing those
who hate us with drone strikes and these other strikes that end
up killing innocent people. And then that is what they talk
about for the next 100 years, just like the Pashtuns in
Afghanistan who defeated the Russians.
So what kind of foreign policy do you think makes sense,
instead of going in this direction of spending billions and
billions of dollars in a failed policy in Afghanistan, that we
will continue to pass bills to keep funding it, and then at
some point in time, when we hit $21 trillion to $22 trillion in
debt, which might happen in the next 2 years, then our whole
country is in an economic collapse?
How do you get, say, a Congress to understand what is the
right policy versus a policy of keeping to spend, spend, spend,
and you get nothing but chaos in Afghanistan?
John Sopko has said that corruption is worse today in
Afghanistan than it was 16 years ago. To my comments, would you
give me a statement in rebuttal or a statement that I am
somewhat not off track?
Mr. Ambassador, I will start with you.
Ambassador Jeffrey. You are not off track, Congressman. Our
national budget and the deficit are core national security
concerns. Nonetheless, there are ways to do this over the long
term without breaking the bank. There are ways to do it over
the long term without, as Mr. Jenkins rightly said,
antagonizing those people because we are in Muslim lands
killing their people.
For example, I did an inventory. We have from Pakistan to
Egypt, in that region, long-term presence in 13 countries. In
each country the presence is relatively minimal, but it is
serving a good purpose over the long term securing things.
Taken all together, I am sure it is less than the 28,000
troops we have in Korea since 1950. And that is probably
costing us more money than most of what we are doing in the
Middle East.
But we all understand that on the long run it buys us, and
it buys the region security without getting us, at least up
until now, in trouble. So that is the only way forward I could
point out.
You try to limit your commitments to be something that is
sustainable in terms of the American public, the budget, and
casualties, and also not try to provoke people in these
regions. And we have been successful both in the Middle East
and elsewhere in the world in doing that. It is not impossible.
What is impossible and gets to the second question that
came up, is changing the region. Because of the concerns you
raised, Mr. Jones, people want to somehow rush in and just end
this. We don't want to keep being there for decades, so we try
to find a solution. We try to get to hearts and minds, and that
is where, A, we start sending up the bills.
Right now, the fight against ISIS, I think over the last
year, was $7 billion. I think, this committee would know better
than I, but somewhere around that. We burned through $7 billion
in a few weeks in Iraq for years, and I was there to watch it.
So I think that there is a way we can do this. But I
realize it is hard to persuade people because this is a very,
very good question. Thank you.
The Chairman. Mrs. Davis.
Mrs. Davis. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, and thank you all for
being here and increasing our understanding. In light of the
discussion right now, where would you suggest that resources
really be focused and directed in a way that perhaps you don't
see them being directed today? And could you include with that
any additional authorities that you think are required to
continue this battle, essentially?
If I can--Ambassador Jeffrey, you were going on that vein.
If you want to focus on it a little bit?
Ambassador Jeffrey. Bearing in mind, having just committed
myself to limit the public's resources trying----
Mrs. Davis. Understanding that, but where should they be
that maybe they are not being?
Ambassador Jeffrey. While I am personally a skeptic about
working to try to change the mindset in the region about
terrorism, about extremist philosophies and such, it doesn't
hurt to try because I could be wrong and it isn't a lot of
money.
So that is one place where we are putting a lot of
attention with, as you heard so far, limited success, but we
might succeed tomorrow. We have done this in other areas,
Eastern Europe, for example, successfully. And so perhaps it is
worth--it is certainly worth trying.
Secondly, intelligence. That is crucial that we know what
is going on out there and who is coming at us as soon as
possible. That has helped us a lot in homeland defense. That is
something that is really vital.
Thirdly, supporting this very limited but effective
military force, who will not be large, who will not be tasked
to change the mindset of whole populations, but will be given
specific military missions that they can do.
We can take out ISIS in Mosul. We want to do it with
partners, which is right, but a lot of that will require U.S.
leadership, U.S. firepower, U.S. combat experience and some
people on the ground, at least as advisors. That is the kind of
thing we have to reinforce as well.
But, again, if the region is all screwed up, there is
nothing we can do to deal with this popping up of new terrorist
movements everywhere. So everything we can do diplomatically,
politically, economically, and militarily to keep the region in
the sort of calm state that we have been so successful
elsewhere in the world, from Central and South America to the
Balkans, that will help.
Mrs. Davis. Mr. Jenkins, can you respond?
Mr. Jenkins. You know, in all of the questions that have
come up, thus far, there is an understandable skepticism about
what we have received in return for the resources that we have
invested. And that reflects the fact that Americans are
pragmatists. If we invest something, we want to know what we
get in return and how are we doing in this.
But in this particular case, that skepticism on the part of
Congress, I think, is entirely appropriate because in the
immediate wake of 9/11 the issue was spare no expense. Do
whatever we have to do to prevent another 9/11.
It is not which button we will press. We will press every
single button. One of them has to work. And fortunately, it
worked, a combination of what we did and luck.
But now, looking for the long haul, we have become more
sensitive to both how much we do and how we go about doing
that. Part of that is imposed by the terrible costs that we
have incurred thus far.
But here, to underscore the ambassador's remarks, in that
if you look at the more recent activities, where we have worked
together with the Kurds or other Arabs in Syria, or we have
done more things with special forces, or we have done more
things with local partners, military and nonmilitary, the
resources there have been a fraction of the terrible price that
we have paid, if you look back at the previous 15 years,
especially the first 10 years after 9/11.
Mrs. Davis. Thank you.
Could I let--Colonel could you just respond quickly then?
Colonel Price. Yes, absolutely. I agree with most of what
has been said. I mean, in my opinion, the three places to
improve. I agree, intel is one place where you will always get
a great return on your investment. The two places--one cost
efficient one where I think we can make a lot of room is in the
informational domain; again, I think that public-private
partnerships is the way forward there.
The last one is not very cost efficient, but it has to do
with improving governance programs, diplomatic and economic
programs to improve governance in the places that are fostering
this violence.
Mrs. Davis. Okay. Thank you.
Thank you Mr. Chairman.
The Chairman. Thank you.
Mr. Wilson.
Mr. Wilson. Thank you Mr. Chairman. Thank each of you for
being here. And Ambassador, in particular I want to thank you
for pointing out that the people of the Middle East really do
want to live in the 21st century.
Having had the opportunity to visit from Beirut to Amman to
Dubai, I explained to my constituents at home that many of
these countries, cities, look like Hilton Head on steroids. And
so they really want to really be part of the 21st century.
And then it is personal to me. All four of my sons have
served there. My oldest son was field artillery in Iraq. My
second son was a doctor serving in Baghdad. My third son served
Bright Star Signal in Egypt, and my fourth guy was an engineer
in Afghanistan serving with the local military. And so I am
just so hopeful that we can back them up.
But sadly, the legacy of President Obama is a failure by
not taking ISIS seriously, by declaring a red line that was not
serious, by not having a status of forces agreement. To me, he
has not learned the lesson of 9/11, which was where there is a
safe haven, such as Afghanistan, that the American families are
at risk.
And we see it even today. I was in New York on Monday and
thank goodness that there were police officers, there were law
enforcement, there were first responders, there were National
Guard, every 5 feet in a city that shouldn't be under siege,
but they are. And I want to make every effort that we can to
defeat terrorists from overseas.
And with that in mind, Colonel Price, you have referenced
this, and that is that we need to counteract the social media
of the Islamic terrorists. And how can we do this best, and
what is the role of the Department of Defense?
Colonel Price. Sir, so obviously I am not here speaking on
behalf of the Department of Defense, but I can offer some of
the academic perspectives in terms of what we can do in a
social media realm. And I think this goes back to the public-
private partnerships that we can foster in order to do more in
this space.
What is interesting is that, as I mentioned before, the
jihadists are very adept at skirting around the different ways
to both communicate, but to do it in a way that is not always
illegal. And so I think this will ultimately come down to a
policy question that I am not really equipped to speak on.
Mr. Wilson. And for each of you, and it could relate to how
we address this, and that is, are there legislative authorities
that are needed to address the specific aspects of countering
the cyber threats to our country?
Mr. Jenkins. I don't know it is a matter of legislative
authority. I think those authorities are there, and I think we
are making some progress. A couple of areas that have already
been mentioned that I think we are not fully exploiting, one
is, Colonel Price is absolutely correct.
There is an extraordinary trove of documents produced by Al
Qaeda, produced by ISIL, which I don't know why they are
classified. I don't see that it is our responsibility to
maintain our enemies'--protect their secrets. These would be
better served in the public domain, because I think they would
be really instructive. I would make those available.
And I think another thing that is an underutilized resource
is we have some of these people coming back from this
experience. We do have--they can be utilized more. I know our
tendency is, and it is understandable, this is a nation of law,
to say, well, we will lock them up and put them away and forget
about them.
That is fine, but that is an underutilized resource. And it
doesn't make any difference whether we think they are sincere
or not, but certainly they, not we, represent the most
effective voices against jihad, against radicalization.
So among these many hundreds who we have in Europe and
here, we could utilize them a lot more in terms of their own
propaganda against their own side.
Mr. Wilson. And we look forward to your input.
And, Ambassador, I want to thank you also. You cited
success stories. People need to know. I have just returned from
a wedding in Bogota, Colombia.
The success of Plan Colombia, just it would have been
inconceivable, the thought that anybody would have gone to a
wedding and feel like they would have been safe. But due to the
success of the American military, now that dynamic country of
40 million people is free and dynamic. So thank you for your
service.
Ambassador Jeffrey. Thank you. We diplomats will take some
credit for Colombia, too, Congressman.
The Chairman. Mr. O'Rourke.
Mr. O'Rourke. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I wanted to comment
on some of the lessons learned that have been described by the
panel, all of which are very helpful, some of which, especially
Ambassador Jeffrey, you talked about our failure to react in a
timely fashion.
But I also want to talk about some of those things that we
have done in the past that have precipitated some of the
problems that we see today. And perhaps looking forward, some
of the actions that we can take that could potentially prevent
them that may not be military in nature.
And I really appreciate my colleague, Mr. Jones, pointing
out that 2003, the invasion of Iraq set off a chain of
consequences, some of them factoring into what we are talking
about today. And then the decision to remove Muammar Gaddafi in
Libya had some very negative consequences, which we are still
dealing with today.
There is an interesting article in addition to the one that
Mr. Jenkins contributed to in the Atlantic, published in the
New York Times, written by Scott Anderson, ``How the Arab World
Came Apart.''
And one of the things that he notes is that in these areas
where we are concerned about ISIS in Syria, in Iraq, and in
Libya, they all had something in common, which is that, you
know, 100 years ago they were creations of the West. They
weren't inherently--you know, there was no real Syria. There
was no real Libya. There was no real Iraq.
And these artificial political constructions could really
only be kept together by a strongman. And typically the West
would put a strongman of the minority tribe or sect in power.
And it has produced some of the problems that we see today.
This lack of coherence, this lack of national identity,
this problem that despite the fact that we spent $60 billion
training and equipping the Iraqi Army, there was no real Iraqi
Army and they melted in the face of a far more insignificant
force in ISIS.
And so my question is, to expand on the excellent question
from the chairman, let us look 15 years back, let us look 15
years forward. Could you look 100 years back and 100 years
forward with me? Is there something we could do to facilitate a
different political construction in these three countries?
You know, the shorthand term for this is partition, but
that acknowledges that these are not real countries the way
that we think of countries and acknowledges the sectarian
interests, the tribal interests, the familial interests that
trump national identity. It may be the least bad option of a
number of bad options before us. Convince me why it is not
worth exploring and pursuing.
Mr. Jenkins. I think the reality is, as I mentioned in my
testimony, that the partitions that we currently see in Syria
and Iraq are going to persist. I know diplomats have to be
optimists. And for a variety of reasons we have to remain
committed, at least in theory, to the territorial integrity of
Syria and Iraq. The reality on the ground is quite different.
Without abandoning the notion that we are in the business
of being the new Sykes-Picot people who will now draw new lines
in the sand, I do think that it might alter our approach to
recognize that reality and instead of thinking in terms of
broad peace agreements that will encompass the entire nation or
governments that will be created that will be able to command
the loyalty of all citizens within those territories, that we
accept the reality and perhaps go for more modest local
accommodations.
That is, instead of one grand peace treaty, a series of
small steps that are aimed only at limiting--lowering the level
of violence and allowing some commerce to take place and life
to come back to something approaching normality, as opposed to
going for these three-point diplomatic shots that we sometimes
try for.
Ambassador Jeffrey. If I could very quickly, Congressman, I
agree with everything Mr. Jenkins said, but there are two
problems with this that I think we need to consider.
First of all, other than East Asia, I know of no part of
the world where you have got countries with each its own ethnic
religious group by and large, and a little bit Europe.
What you described in the Middle East is absolutely
correct, but Sub-Saharan Africa saw the same thing without the
same level of huge turmoil and generator of terrorism that we
see in the Middle East.
And Latin America, again, that was basically one big
Spanish set of colonies that then broke apart with very similar
ethnic and religious backgrounds, but managed to survive as a
set of independent countries. So that is the first thing. It
may be that there is a special problem in the Middle East that
we don't see elsewhere, and fixing borders won't fix that
special problem.
The second thing is, as I mentioned in my opening remarks,
supporting the international order, national sovereignty,
national unity should be our default position because it is
what we represent. We can make exceptions to that, as Mr.
Jenkins said, and as I was involved in in the Balkans where we
helped break up countries.
But one requirement that worked in the Balkans and that
hasn't worked in the Middle East is if you are going to do any
fiddling inside a country, everybody in that region has to be
with you. Because if only one is against you, Syria and Iran
with Iraq, Pakistan with Afghanistan, we know all too well in
this room what happens. Thank you.
The Chairman. Mr. Wittman.
Mr. Wittman. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Lieutenant Colonel
Price, I wanted to follow up on your written testimony where
you talked about what the United States did after major
operations in Iraq ceased and our presence there and lack of
presence there and what led to the current security situation.
We find ourselves now 5 years after that significantly
reduced military presence in Iraq. We see what is happening
now. I expect in the months to come there will be another major
offensive, perhaps to retake Mosul.
The question then becomes what should the U.S. role be to
ensure security in Iraq after Mosul is, hopefully, regained
from ISIL?
Colonel Price. Yes, sir. So in my testimony I did discuss
that a little bit. Unfortunately, this problem is not unique to
the United States, as Ambassador Jeffrey pointed out earlier.
Doing this type of work and finding leverage in other countries
to govern the way you would like to govern is extremely
difficult.
One thing I will say, though, is that I believe that if you
take a look at most of the debates surrounding our campaign
against the Islamic State today, I would argue that most of
those debates are centered around the ways and means of
attacking them, discussions about boots on the ground and troop
levels, rules of engagement, airstrikes, building partner
capacity, and so forth. I think the real debates need to focus
around what happens after.
Mr. Wittman. Yes.
Colonel Price. I think the Islamic State, the last thing I
will say is that they have created an interesting scenario
because they have created a lot of enemies in the region. And
so I believe that we are going to be successful in retaking
territory. My concern is what happens after, and I would like
to see more national debate on that.
Mr. Wittman. Let me ask this. Having visited there--I went
up to Kurdistan, visited with the Kurds, visited with the
government in Baghdad--and I use the term ``government''
loosely, and seeing what they are dealing with with Sunnis and
Shias in that region versus the Kurds up north, the
disagreements the Kurds have had with this Baghdad government.
Is the future one that is likely to hold a country that is
not like we saw Iraq previously, with it having those three
areas united as one country, would it be potentially divided
where you would have a Kurdistan, you would have Shia and Sunni
regions that would be regionalized governments, perhaps
operating under some centralized government in Baghdad?
Give me your perspective about how governance would occur
after you regain security. Obviously, security has to happen
first, but give me your idea about what governance would--what
you think it would look like after that?
Colonel Price. Yes, sir. There is no really easy answer to
that question, and I would honestly be interested in hearing
what Ambassador Jeffrey would have to say on this topic.
I think the only thing that I will add, and again, this is
in my own personal opinion, the key question, whether you are
talking about post-hostilities in Iraq or Syria, the key
fundamental governance question is are these states able to
provide an alternative and credible form of government that is
going to be preferable to living the jihadist lifestyle?
Mr. Wittman. Yes.
Colonel Price. A very difficult task. I will cede my time
to my colleague.
Mr. Wittman. Ambassador.
Ambassador Jeffrey. Very quickly, to build on Colonel
Price's comments, first of all, government in parentheses, you
are absolutely right.
Mr. Wittman. Yeah.
Ambassador Jeffrey. But that is okay.
Mr. Wittman. Yeah.
Ambassador Jeffrey. That is how most of East Asia 40 years
ago looked, corruption, quasi-dictatorial regimes, army
generals coming in in Korea. Taiwan was a problem. Thailand is
still a problem. But we somehow deal with them.
The answer to Iraq is it was functioning pretty well in the
period of time from the end of the surge, 2009 to roughly 2013.
Many factors led to the decline of the state, including a lack
of attention by us, and increasing sectarian thought and
actions, particularly by the largely Shia Arab government
against the Sunni Arabs. The Kurds and the Shias kind of worked
things out in their own unique way.
But I would say that you could go back to that. You will
have all of the problems that you hear when you are out there,
but you have a lot of problems in Egypt. You have a lot of
problems elsewhere in the region. It can work. I have seen it
work.
The most important thing, though, the delta, is we have to
stay in there diplomatically and militarily. That means dealing
with Iran, because job one for Iran, as soon as the ISIS battle
is over, is to get our 5,000 people out of there.
We have to find a way to persuade everyone in Iraq that
that is a bad idea, and to some degree, to persuade Iran that
it is a bad idea in the long run for Iran, too. That is a much
bigger problem. I touched on it in my testimony. But it is
going to haunt us as long as we are trying to stabilize the
region.
Mr. Wittman. Very good.
Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I yield back.
The Chairman. Thank you.
Ms. Gabbard.
Ms. Gabbard. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Just briefly, a
follow-up to Ambassador Jeffrey on that point. Do you think
that the very closely and intertwined relationship between the
Shia government in Baghdad and Iran can be so easily supplanted
by our 5,000 troops on the ground in our engagement there?
Ambassador Jeffrey. Absolutely not, Congresswoman. We have
to live with the fact that Iran will have a great deal of
influence in Iraq, not just with the largely Shia government
and the Shia in the south, but frankly, with many of the Kurds
in the north. I have seen that as well.
The question is do we want to compete with Iran or turn the
place over to them? One of the problems with letting the place
split into its three components is the other two components
tend to anchor the Shia south in a sort of independent status.
If Iran really were in charge, it would have long since
picked up the phone and said why are you exporting up to 4
million barrels of oil a day? This is killing us on oil
exports.
And believe me, those 2 million additional barrels of oil
that Iran--Iraq is exporting now compared to a decade ago,
thanks largely to us and international oil companies, that is
one of the reasons oil prices are so low. That is good for your
American consumers, but it is not good for Iran.
Iran doesn't do that because it knows the Iraqis would say
no. You break that country up, the Shia south is going to have
to gravitate into Iran's orbit in a way much more than today.
Total oil reserves in Iran and the Shia south of Iraq are
greater than Saudi Arabia's.
That is something worth combating, and I think we can stay
in there, and I think we can push back. But it takes a lot of
effort, and it is going to take, again, dealing directly with
Iran.
Ms. Gabbard. That is a big conversation that we can get
into about the three-state possibility for Iraq and the
consequence of, as Mr. Jenkins mentioned, the reality on the
ground, which is that this partition, in essence, has already
taken place.
And the vacuum that has been created by the oppression of
the Sunni tribes and others by the Shia government has allowed
groups like ISIS to, in fact, come in, which leads me to my
question. Much of the testimony today and much of the talk in
the media, much of the conversation from the administration as
well as from military leaders on the ground in places like
Syria, is their mission is to defeat ISIS, period.
And when we ask questions about what about Al Qaeda? What
about the group formerly known as al-Nusra? What about these
other jihadist groups? Why are we not targeting them, or are we
targeting them? And the answers are really insufficient and
really speak to the fact that we are not.
As a result, groups like al-Nusra, now JFS [Jabhat Fateh
Al-Sham], have really integrated themselves deeply within
Syrian society right under our noses to the point where if the
administration is successful in removing Assad, the likelihood
is that these groups, a.k.a. Al Qaeda, would take over,
creating a greater threat, not only to the region but to the
world.
Can you speak to the issue of why things have been so
completely focused on this group called ISIS rather than
recognizing the fact that Al Qaeda still has leading terror
groups all around the world? And why more is not being done,
therefore, then to take the next step to address defeating the
ideology?
Mr. Jenkins. I am not sure that we are ignoring Al Qaeda
around the world. I mean, there are continuing efforts and
efforts that have achieved the measure of success in reducing
the capacity of al-Shabaab in Somalia, an Al Qaeda affiliate.
There is an ongoing campaign, which the United States is
supporting, to go after Al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula, in
Yemen. And at least with the air campaign some of that has been
also directed against Al Qaeda's affiliate in Syria.
But you do underscore an issue here, and that is that what
used to be the, you know, the performing actor formerly known
as Jabhat al-Nusra has, in fact, become a part of, embedded
itself deeply in this broader coalition of rebel forces against
them.
And it is extremely difficult and will become more so for
us to precisely target that component without weakening what is
essentially still a U.S.-backed broader rebel effort against
Assad.
All of this comes about because of the fundamental problem.
And that is, for the Sunni population in Syria, the only
avatars they have, the only military defenders they have right
now are the Islamic State and this coalition of rebel forces
dominated by jihadists.
There is not another force in the area that can protect
that Sunni population. So we have the dilemma that part of the
people we are supporting includes a component of the very
people we are against.
Ms. Gabbard. Precisely.
Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
The Chairman. Thank you.
Mr. Gibson.
Mr. Gibson. Thanks, Mr. Chairman. Appreciate the panelists.
We heard from you earlier your testimony about how important
the competition of ideas is.
And also in some of your testimony you talked about
declassification of information. And it caused me to reflect on
a very significant experience that I had during the surge.
Ambassador Jeffrey, you may remember this from Iraq.
But in the early summer, General McChrystal and the Joint
Special Operations Command had captured a high-value target,
and in his debriefing, essentially exposed the fraudulent
nature of Al Qaeda in Iraq.
At that point, they were really trying to say how this was
homegrown and there were all kinds of Iraqis that were involved
in this. And this individual we had captured, he basically said
no. It is all penetrated. It is all foreign. They have one
token that is in the lead.
And I bring it up because General McChrystal, I think, made
a very courageous and smart decision. He declassified all that
information the first week of July and--I think it was about
the first week of July--and that helped us so much.
I mean, as the operations officer for everything north of
Baghdad, this helped us in Mosul and Khilafah and Baqubah and
Tikrit because we were able to have engagements and say look.
Look what has happened. This was right on the cusp of the Sunni
Awakening moving from the west over to Diyala Province. And say
look, these guys are complete frauds.
And, you know, it really struck me that, you know, he was--
which is not surprising for General McChrystal, but he was
really taking on some risk in declassifying this information
and using it in a way that we were targeting with it.
And so my question is, you know, looking across now and
elevating and thinking about this as a national endeavor, you
know, what recommendations do you have as far as laws or
guidance on enhancing our agility to declassify to win this
competition of ideas?
And in your remarks, any specific recommendations you would
have for either the President and the executive branch or for
us from the Congress in terms of congressional delegation
trips, messaging, hearings that will help on this score.
Colonel Price. Sir, the case that you just mentioned was
one that we highlight in the Combating Terrorism Center all of
the time because General McChrystal actually gave those
documents to the CTC. They were referred to as the Sinjar
Documents. And they disclosed, like you accurately mentioned,
the foreign fighter threat that was going. It was not a
homegrown threat.
In fact, when we were able to do that analysis on those
documents, we were able to determine that, when you take a look
at the per capita donors from specific countries, I think
everyone had assumed that Saudi Arabia was going to be the
largest donor at that time. And they did--they were number one
on the list.
But another state that was number two was Libya. And when
you--we were able to parse out that data down to the actual
towns where these individuals were coming from. Again, as you
mentioned, this is 2007. The two highest per capita were Derna
and Benghazi. And this was well before Benghazi was a household
name.
And so when you talk about what systems are available for
us to do this, there is a joint collaborative program between
the Combating Terrorism Center along with U.S. Special
Operations Command called the Harmony Program.
And that was the vehicle by which General McChrystal and
others used in order to declassify those. That program is still
in function today, and we look forward to getting more
declassified documents.
Mr. Gibson. How about other thoughts in terms of how we can
get, you know, more agile and more effective in this domain,
this competition of ideas? Because, you know, certainly there
is a continuum between speed and effectiveness and protection
of sources, and I get all that. But are there any sort of
lessons that you can draw out of this that we could really hone
in on and be more effective with the whole-of-government
approach?
Ambassador Jeffrey. In my experience, which includes trying
to supervise parts of that underlying--trying when I was in the
White House, it is very complicated because there are always
two reasons why you classify information.
One is the actual damage that that information might do if
it came out into the public sector. But as Colonel Price and
you just indicated, Congressman, in many cases it is
advantageous for us to have that information out there.
The second reason, and that is where you get to
bureaucracy, your role, the role of the executive, is sources
and methods. That is, it is an innocuous piece of information.
It would do good, not bad if the American public could read it,
if people abroad could read it, if you could have access to it
freely.
But people are afraid because, by some algorithm of steps
and actions and mathematical formulas, that could somehow
reveal how we gather information. I am less worried about that,
I think, than many people are.
But this is something that you have to discuss with the
intelligence committees and the intelligence community because
they are very ferocious on this, sometimes correctly, sometimes
not. But if you want to be fast and agile, you need to look
into that specifically.
The Chairman. I think we should.
Mr. Nugent.
Mr. Nugent. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. And you don't paint a
pretty picture as to how this is going to be resolved in the
future. Only because, I think, the dynamics in the Middle East
are so diverse. We have talked about, you know, in Colombia, in
other states, we didn't have the two religious organizations
that are the largest in that area, the Shia and the Sunnis, at
odds with each other.
So how do we ever resolve that issue, which I think, you
know, is the underlying issue that percolates up through all of
this, whether it is, you know, tribal? But it really goes back
to their, you know, you got Iran who the majority is Shia,
right? And, you know, the rest of the countries in that area,
the majority is Sunni.
So how do we resolve that issue? Is there a resolve? And
can we play a part in that? And Mr. Ambassador, you have had
the ability to deal with those over the years. What is your
take?
Ambassador Jeffrey. I have had about 30 years, counting
Turkey, in the region and working on the region, and I was just
out there and talked to the leaders of Israel, Saudi Arabia,
and Turkey over the past month. I like the area. It is
fascinating, and it doesn't have to be what we see right now.
And there are times when it hasn't. For example, the Shia-
Sunni split and the conflicts that emerged from them, which I
was so worried about I put considerable time into it in my
written testimony as an accelerant for terrorism in this
region.
That is something that while it has been latent before,
these people, Sunni and Shia Arabs and other ethnic groups with
that split, have lived together in relative peace for most of
the history of the Middle East.
It is something that can go back together, just like
Orthodox and Muslims lived in peace in Bosnia and other places
in the Balkans for centuries. And then bang, in the 1990s, what
happened? A breakdown in order, an unwillingness of the
international community to engage, and the evil forces that are
always latent, bubble up and become omnipresent. We have that
with a vengeance right now in the region.
But again, while we can't go in and fix it per se, the
region itself can fix it if given enough time and given enough
stability. Our job from the outside, and it is not something we
can do alone, we need to do it with our European friends and
our allies and partners in the region, is to dampen down the
exploitation of this violence and insecurity by forces,
beginning with terrorist forces, Iran, and at times even our
own friends who get carried away in responding to these
threats.
But that takes a very present United States. Not with whole
armies, not with hundreds of billions of dollars a year in
expenditures, but the kind of presence that over most of the
period since the 1970s we have been able to do in the region
and with relative success. Over the long term, I am optimistic,
but I realize it may be a hard sell today.
Mr. Nugent. Well, I mean, we tend to want to force our view
of government on other governments. And I think, you know, we
saw that with Saddam Hussein, with, I mean, all the dictators
out there. And we want to impose what we think is the proper
form of government.
And not every country or people are ready for democracy as
we see it for a number of reasons. And Iran, obviously, you
have touched on it, Iran is a huge player.
And I agree with your testimony that we can't just leave a
void there and allow Iran to fill that. If we abandon the
Middle East, what are we going to get? And I think we have seen
part of it.
And Lieutenant Colonel Price, I am very interested, having
two sons that went to West Point, on your take in regards to
what are we trying to impart upon our future leaders and our
leaders within the military as to how we go about this?
Because we do have the ability militarily to do certain
things, but I don't know that--and we have talked about we
don't have the will in the United States, nor the money to
continue. What is your take?
Colonel Price. Yes, so very briefly, sir, one of the
reasons why the organization that I lead and stood up was for
that very reason. When I was a cadet, we did not have any type
of formal education when it came to these types of topics,
whether it be terrorism, counterterrorism, counterinsurgency.
These are complex issues that our young American service men
and women are facing.
Mr. Nugent. And I--you know, my son was a plebe when the
Twin Towers went down, or he just finished his plebe year. So
you are right. We didn't have a whole lot of experience in
that. But I am sorry to interrupt.
Colonel Price. Yes, sir. So part of this is learning about
these topics in a more academically rigorous session. The other
things that we have done is we have enhanced the academy's
overseas programs to get more cultural education to our cadets.
But ultimately, at the end of the day, and this is not
specific to the U.S. Military Academy or others, but it is
teaching our young military leaders how to think and not what
to think. That is all.
Mr. Nugent. I appreciate it.
I yield back, Mr. Chairman. Thank you.
The Chairman. Thank you.
Mr. Bridenstine.
Mr. Bridenstine. Thank you, Mr. Chair. Ambassador Jeffrey,
you were our ambassador during the withdrawal from Iraq. You
were our ambassador to Iraq. I wasn't in Congress at the time,
but I was in the military.
And what we were being told at the time was that there was
no status of forces agreement ratified by the Iraqi Parliament
and therefore we had to pull out. That was the talking point
that we heard over and over again.
Currently, we have 5,000 troops in Iraq. Did the parliament
ratify a status of forces agreement, and if not, how do we have
5,000 troops there now?
Ambassador Jeffrey. And that is a good question,
Congressman. Give me a second to track this back, because I was
involved in this first in the White House in the Bush
administration, and then on the field in the Obama
administration.
As part of the--our authorities in Iraq up until 2008 were
based on a U.N. Security Council resolution. The Iraqi
government in 2008 said this has got to end.
So President Bush then went in and got a status of forces
agreement that gave us immunities for our troops, but the cost
of that was--to get it through the Iraqi Parliament, and
everybody agreed that it had to go through the Iraqi Parliament
to be legally binding, was we had to put a limit on how long we
would stay.
So that limit was the end of 2011. The Obama administration
came in, and then after General Austin and I----
Mr. Bridenstine. So in 2008, it did go through what was----
Ambassador Jeffrey. It did go through the parliament. That
is right, sir.
Mr. Bridenstine. It did. Okay.
Ambassador Jeffrey. Then, in 2010, General Austin and I
came to Iraq. And soon we said, hey, we don't want to do a
withdrawal in 18 months. Let us recommend that we keep troops
on.
We went back and forth with the administration. President
Obama brought us in and said, okay, we will try to negotiate a
new status of forces agreement.
With one exception, all of his advisers and all of them at
the top two tiers, said, yeah, we have to get one through
parliament because the last one went through parliament and, in
a democratic system, it really won't have legal--because what
you are doing with a status of forces agreement is saying Jim--
or you as a solider, or you as a soldier, Congresswoman, are
exempt from the laws of a country.
Mr. Bridenstine. Right.
Ambassador Jeffrey. It is not something----
Mr. Bridenstine. Critically important.
Ambassador Jeffrey. Yeah. It is critically important, but
it is something that it takes either diplomatic status, which
is a treaty, or it takes something that has to be legally
binding in a state like Iraq under that constitution, and that
is the parliament.
So our position was we need a status of forces agreement.
In the end, the Iraqis said, okay. We can put up with troops
in-country, but we don't want to give you a status of forces
agreement that will go through the parliament because, hey, the
Russians didn't need this. Why do you need it?
And Prime Minister Maliki said, ``I will just sign a
document.'' Everybody, with one exception, concluded that that
wasn't acceptable, so we went without the troops at the end of
2011.
Then in 2014, under very different emergency conditions,
the President decided that he could live with, essentially--and
I haven't seen the document, but I know it exists--an executive
agreement that our troops will have, to the extent possible,
immunities. I don't know what the language.
It is pretty threadbare. The difference is when you have an
emergency where foreign horrific forces gobble up a third of
your country and kill tens of thousands of your citizens,
probably we can send forces in in an emergency basis without
those same legal protections, because the country dramatically
needs us.
In 2011, when the troops left, Congressman, there was
almost no fighting in-country. People were--Iraqis were not
quite sure why we wanted to stay on. That was my concern, that
we would be harassed by, for example, Sadrist police, extremist
judges, and other things, and therefore, we needed that
protection. Now----
Mr. Bridenstine. Well, that is more clarity than I have had
on that the entire time I have been here. So thank you. That is
a great answer.
Ambassador Jeffrey. Thank you.
Mr. Bridenstine. I want--and I have got just maybe a minute
left. Colonel Price, how important is human intelligence to
winning this fight?
Colonel Price. I think it is absolutely critical, and I
think that it has led to a lot of our counterterrorism
successes since 2001.
Mr. Bridenstine. Real quick, do you know offhand how many
prisoners, how many ISIS prisoners we have captured?
Colonel Price. No, sir. I wouldn't be able to answer that.
Mr. Bridenstine. A couple of months ago, I asked the
Secretary of Defense and the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs, and
they gave me one. Do you know if we have captured any more than
that since then?
Colonel Price. I don't know, sir.
Mr. Bridenstine. Is that important to being able to get
human intelligence?
Colonel Price. Sir, is your question is that taking
prisoners is important to----
Mr. Bridenstine. That is my question.
Colonel Price [continuing]. Gaining intelligence?
Mr. Bridenstine. Yes.
Colonel Price. Yes, I think that you can glean information
from captured terrorists. Yes, sir.
Mr. Bridenstine. Okay. We have had a conversation about
hard power and soft power. You talked about public-private
partnerships. One thing I would like to get on record. Are you
familiar with the Overseas Private Investment Corporation?
Colonel Price. No, sir.
Mr. Bridenstine. Anyone else on the panel familiar with it?
Can you guys talk about whether or not that is important, and
if it is something we as Members of Congress should be involved
in making sure continues?
Ambassador Jeffrey. It is really good bang for the buck. I
have dealt with it. It has been a long time. I cannot talk
specifics, but it is one of the things we sort of smile when we
hear about our government doing abroad as opposed to other
things that we are a little skeptical about, that are bigger,
clumsier, and don't get money out.
Mr. Bridenstine. Okay.
Mr. Jenkins.
Mr. Jenkins. Absolutely. It is extremely useful in
providing the assurance that we need. Not to put aside
insurance, but the assurance that investors need and traders
need to make this work. I would agree with the ambassador. It
is a big bang for the buck.
Mr. Bridenstine. That is good to know.
I yield back, Mr. Chairman.
The Chairman. Mr. Byrne.
Mr. Byrne. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Thank you, gentlemen. I
think I am the end here, so that is the good news for you.
I want to go to the topic of our allies in the Middle East.
I think if not explicit, implicit in all of your testimony is
we can't do this alone. Now, I am concerned about the
relationship that we presently have with our allies.
Some of us have been over there and talked to our allies.
We certainly read things that they have been saying. It seems
that they are worried that we have gotten too close to Iran at
their expense.
And so I would like for you to speak to this notion that we
have to pick who we are going to be with. In other words, is it
the situation where we can have a relationship with Iran and
cause problems thereby with our other allies, our Gulf allies,
our Saudi Arabia allies, our Jordanian, Egyptian allies?
Or can you thread that needle where, yeah, you can have
some sort of a relationship with Iran and still have that very
strong, important, positive relationship with our allies?
There are some of us that are worried that we are leaving
the girl we brought to the dance at the dance and going off
dancing with another girl, and that is not a good thing. Or
perhaps a better way to say that, we are in a fight and we have
left our friends in the fight and gone to our adversary in the
fight.
I might also add that I would like, if you can, talk a
little bit there also about how we are presently treating the
president of Egypt, Mr. el-Sisi, who has in many ways been very
strong in advocating our interests in that region. So if you
could speak to our relationships with our allies and whether it
is in the right place or whether it needs to change?
Ambassador Jeffrey. If I could start, as I said, I have
just been in the region, and I have talked to Prime Minister
Netanyahu, the head of the Israeli opposition, to the king of
Saudi Arabia, the crown prince, deputy crown prince, and to
President Erdogan.
And everybody is echoing exactly what you are saying,
Congressman, that they want more American presence in the
region, military, diplomatic, political, obviously economic,
but they focus on diplomatic. And they want a stronger position
against Iran.
Now I mentioned earlier, both Iran as a source of basically
pushing the area more into terror, but also as someone in Iraq
and elsewhere we have to deal with. And we do have to deal with
it. We had to deal with it one or another way on the nuclear
account. We have to deal with it in its presence in the region.
But here is where I draw the line. There are countries,
however flawed, that support the international status quo and
want us in the region. Egypt is a good example. Turkey is
another, however difficult.
Secondly, there are countries that while we may have to
deal with them on things, ultimately don't want us there and
want a different Middle East. That is ISIS. That is Iran. And
therefore how we deal with them has to be different.
We had relations with the Soviet Union for 40 years. We did
agreement after agreement with them. But we never lost sight of
the fact they and we have totally different visions of the
world.
We and Iran have totally different visions of how the
Middle East should be shaped up, and lest we forget that, we
open the door to exactly the kind of problem you have
described.
Mr. Jenkins. Let me underscore that. I think there was a
sense of perhaps ill-founded euphoria when we signed the deal
with Iran that this would be the beginning of rapprochement and
good relations.
This was a deal. And the notion of some type of
rapprochement, and ultimately some even spoke about strategic
partnership in the region, I think is something that may be
decades down the road, if ever. It is not clear that the
Iranians are interested in that at all.
I think, in terms of dealing with our traditional allies,
as flawed as they are, in the region, I think we have caused
them consternation, not simply because of the arrangement with
Iran, but because of some of our inconstant behavior as we went
through this turbulent Arab Spring, and that caused them to----
Mr. Byrne. The red line, et cetera.
Mr. Jenkins. Various things, a whole list of things so that
the notion was, their concern was if they face a threat, an
overt, obvious threat, we would probably come and assist them.
A more insidious kind of a threat, we would probably give them
a lecture on human rights and democracy and so on. And so that
caused them to be greatly concerned.
Now, I am not saying we ought not to be committed to those
things of human rights, of democracy, and so on. But we also
have to accept that these are not values that we can
automatically export and impose on others or demand as
preconditions for any type of relationship.
And therefore, I think that we have not been as successful
as we could be in exploiting some of the initiatives that have
come out of the local partners that we might do, including some
of the Gulf countries.
Mr. Byrne. Thank you. My time is up, but I hate not to let
Colonel Price respond to that, Mr. Chairman.
Colonel, could you respond to that?
Colonel Price. Sir, I wouldn't have anything to add than
what the other two panelists have already said. Thank you,
though.
The Chairman. Ambassador Jeffrey, you don't have to comment
on this if you don't have an opinion, but your conversation
with Mr. Bridenstine on the Iraq status of forces agreement
leads me to think about an issue that we have before us now.
And that is the bill that allows victims of terrorism to sue in
court other nations, conduct discovery, and so forth.
The United States has more people in more countries around
the world than anybody else. And one of the arguments that
leads to concerns about that is that when you start eroding
sovereign immunity, then that is a slippery slope that puts our
people in greater danger.
Do you have an opinion about this? And again, I don't
want--this is kind of out of the blue, but if you want to,
fine.
Ambassador Jeffrey. I have a very strong opinion, Mr.
Chairman. Normally, I am 90 percent, 10 percent, 70 percent, 30
percent. There are a few issues I am 100 percent on. This is a
really big mistake. This will open the door, potentially, to
legal action against Americans by, you know, criminal courts in
other--criminal in the sense of corrupt--in criminal courts in
other countries.
It will risk the diplomatic immunity that people like me
needed to work in very difficult countries, communist Bulgaria,
for example, in the 1980s. I have seen up close what they were
trying to do to us and how we wrapped ourselves in that
immunity.
This I cannot--totally apart from the importance of Saudi
Arabia in the fight against terror and the competition with
Iran, against any country this would be a mistake. It opens the
door to extraordinary threats to Americans of a legal nature
around the world. Thank you for asking me.
The Chairman. Well, no, I appreciate it. Those are some of
my concerns as well.
One thing we hadn't really talked about today and in my
memory was the, you know, dominant shadow overhanging 9/11, and
that was what if terrorists get their hands on weapons of mass
destruction?
We have seen ISIS use chemical weapons. It has been made
public that Al Qaeda, among others, have worked on biological
sorts of weapons. Do any of you have any comments about that
prospect, how that might change the way we view terrorism, et
cetera?
Mr. Jenkins. I think that any use by terrorists of
chemical, biological, radiological, let alone nuclear weapons,
would have a profound effect on public psychology.
I hesitate to call them weapons of mass destruction because
I think there is a range there. And when we look at what they
were experimenting or what capacities have, the capacity, while
chemical weapons may be more accessible, the capacity would be
quite limited.
While radiological is one that is frequently mentioned, the
so-called dirty bomb, in looking at that from an operational
standpoint, the bomb part, that is the explosion, would be the
source of casualties far more than the radioactive component,
which is likely to be very small quantities of radioactive
material.
These are really weapons where the terrorists use them to
achieve not so much physical effects, but maximum psychological
effects.
And so, beyond taking all reasonable measures to try to
ensure that they don't have that capacity, ranging from
improving security as well as intervening in a preemptive
fashion to ensure that if we have any operational intelligence
that they are moving in that direction, we head it off.
Beyond that, there is a real issue of how we would address
such an event if it occurred, heaven forbid, and that has a lot
to do with how we will handle the media, societal resilience.
If we look at the psychological effects in our saturated media
environment that we operate in and concerns of what has
happened in even ordinary conventional attacks, whether it is
Orlando or the more recent events, one really worries about the
kind of frenzy that would be fueled if they were to get these
weapons.
So I am less concerned about the physical aspects of it
than the psychological impact, which is what terror is all
about.
The Chairman. Yeah. No. It's a great point. Which I guess
leads me to my last question, Colonel Price. Optimistic
scenarios say that Iraqi military with our help clears ISIS out
of Mosul in Iraq.
It is hard for me to see how they get cleared out of Syria
in the foreseeable future, but as I mentioned at the beginning,
ISIS itself says, okay, we may lose our physical caliphate, but
we are going to remain in the virtual caliphate.
Can you comment on that? Does that mean a diminished
danger? Just how big a deal is that if ISIS continues on in a
virtual sense and are we equipped to deal with that? I mean,
you have talked about the public-private partnerships to fight
the ideology, but talk a little about a virtual caliphate.
Colonel Price. Sir, and this goes back to my earlier points
regarding the difficulties and challenge of saying that you are
going to destroy the Islamic State. While you can remove their
military capability, their ability to inspire and potentially
direct attacks with those that are outside of the theater of
combat operations poses a significant threat to others.
As Mr. Jenkins also alluded to earlier, the pathways of
radicalization are extremely complex. And so this is an area
where I think that academics will need to do a better job of
providing more policy-relevant specific recommendations to
bodies like this in that regard.
The danger posed with the advent of the internet now is
that there is no geographic limitations to where this threat
can reside. And so those are the challenges that I see moving
forward.
The Chairman. Okay. Thank you all very much. Helpful and
yet challenging, and I think that is kind of what the country
faces going ahead. But thank you all for being here. With that,
the hearing stands adjourned.
[Whereupon, at 11:52 a.m., the committee was adjourned.]
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A P P E N D I X
September 21, 2016
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PREPARED STATEMENTS SUBMITTED FOR THE RECORD
September 21, 2016
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[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
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QUESTIONS SUBMITTED BY MEMBERS POST HEARING
September 21, 2016
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QUESTIONS SUBMITTED BY MR. LANGEVIN
Mr. Langevin. As we look back to the state of our national security
15 years ago, I believe that we are safer from the type of orchestrated
attack that shocked us all on September 11, 2001. However, I am
concerned that we have not plugged some of the security gaps that still
threaten us today--gaps that led to the attacks in San Bernardino and
Orlando, for example--and I worry that the progress of those who wish
to do us harm has outpaced our ability to defend against nontraditional
threats. Do you believe that we as a government and as a nation have
adjusted over the past 15 years--militarily, politically, and
mentally--so that we can make more rational and effective decisions to
mitigate the evolving threats before us?
Mr. Jeffrey. [No answer was available at the time of printing.]
Mr. Langevin. As we look back to the state of our national security
15 years ago, I believe that we are safer from the type of orchestrated
attack that shocked us all on September 11, 2001. However, I am
concerned that we have not plugged some of the security gaps that still
threaten us today--gaps that led to the attacks in San Bernardino and
Orlando, for example--and I worry that the progress of those who wish
to do us harm has outpaced our ability to defend against nontraditional
threats. Do you believe that we as a government and as a nation have
adjusted over the past 15 years--militarily, politically, and
mentally--so that we can make more rational and effective decisions to
mitigate the evolving threats before us?
Mr. Jenkins. I would agree with you that the United States is safer
now from the type of orchestrated terrorist attack that we suffered on
September 11, 2001. Over the past 15 years, through its military and
intelligence efforts, the United States has made progress both in
degrading al Qaeda's operational capabilities and in creating a more
hostile operating environment for terrorists. U.S. authorities have a
much greater chance now of detecting and disrupting terrorist plots
directed from abroad.
The rise of the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL) created
new challenges, both in the Middle East and domestically, but the
current military campaigns in Iraq and Syria are reducing ISIL's
territory and its operational capabilities. However, we have to
anticipate that the defeat of ISIL on the ground could lead to a surge
in terrorist attacks worldwide as foreign fighters scatter to other
jihadist fronts or bring their violence home. We also have to recognize
that the fall of ISIL does not mean the end of the contest--it will
move underground, with perhaps greater incentive to export violence.
The terrorist threat will continue.
While further improvements can still be made in domestic
intelligence, the United States has expanded its collection effort and
has improved information-sharing within the federal government and
between the federal government and state and local authorities. As a
result, authorities have uncovered and thwarted more than 80 percent of
the known domestic terrorist plots inspired from abroad since 2001.\1\
Without asserting that every single one of these plots would have led
to a deadly attack had authorities not intervened, it is nonetheless a
remarkable achievement.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\1\ Counting terrorist plots can be tricky. In my own research, I
have identified more than 80 cases in which individuals in the United
States, generally motivated by jihadist ideology, plotted terrorist
attacks. These were in various states of maturity from half-baked ideas
to actual attacks. An earlier list of these cases can be in Brian
Michael Jenkins, Stray Dogs and Virtual Armies: Radicalization and
Recruitment to Jihadist Terrorism in the United States since 9/11.
Santa Monica, CA: The RAND Corporation, 2011.
The Heritage Foundation has published a chronology of 60 jihadist
terrorist plots to carry out attacks in the United States since 9/11.
Jessica Zuckerman, Steven Bucci, and James J. Carafano, 60 Terrorist
Plots since 9/11: Continued Lessons in Counterterrorism. Washington DC:
The Heritage Foundation, 2013. http://www.heritage.org/research/
reports/2013/07/60-terror
ist-plots-since-911-continued-lessons-in-domestic-counterterrorism. See
also: David Inserra, ``An Interactive Timeline of Islamist Terror Plots
since 9/11. TheDailySignal, September 10, 2015. As of December 31,
2016, the list totals 91 cases. http://dailysignal.com/2015/09/10/a-
timeline
-of-73-islamist-terror-plots-since-911/.
Obviously, these lists overlap. I would exclude from the Heritage
chronology attempts like that of the Shoe bomber, the Underwear Bomber
and other plots against U.S.-bound aircraft or trains where the
plotting was done outside of the United States along with several other
cases. Ultimately, these are judgment calls. Adding or excluding a case
does not change the overall remarkable record of federal and local
investigators in thwarting terrorist plots. With these exclusions, my
own list runs to 82 jihadist plots. Of these, 69 (or 84 percent) were
uncovered and thwarted by the authorities. In the remaining 14 cases,
the plotters were able to carry out an attempt, although these attempts
were not all successful. Six of the attacks resulted in fatalities, not
counting the attacker. Seven cases resulted in injuries. In the
remaining case, the plotter's bomb failed to explode.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
One hundred percent prevention is unrealistic. Further terrorist
attacks will occur. It is important to keep in mind that the death toll
from those that have occurred thus far is only a tiny fraction of the
total volume of ordinary criminal violence in the United States. And,
together, just two jihadist terrorist attacks (in San Bernardino and
Orlando) account for 71 percent of the total number of fatalities
caused by such attacks in the United States since 9/11.\2\
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\2\ Ibid. The attacks included above resulted in a total of 89
fatalities; 49 were killed in the Orlando attack and 14 in San
Bernardino--a total of 63 (or 70.8 percent of the total.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
You describe these in your question as ``nontraditional threats,''
and in a way, these attacks--along with others, like the shooting in
Chattanooga--depart from the previously presumed patterns of
radicalization.
Like most of the previous plots, the attacks in San Bernardino and
Orlando involved a single individual or a tiny conspiracy (a husband
and wife). The perpetrators of those attacks claimed allegiance to
ISIL, which, in turn, claimed responsibility but played no active role
beyond inspiration. Authorities also uncovered al Qaeda propaganda,
suggesting that the specific group affiliation was not very important
to the killers.
The biographies of the Chattanooga and Orlando shooters reveal
mental health issues, records of substance abuse, histories of
aggression--these were deeply troubled individuals. Violent jihadist
ideology reinforced, channeled, and justified their aggressive
tendencies but ought not to be seen as the sole source of their
inspiration. A complex skein of motives propelled the shooters to
action, and it is difficult to weight the contribution of each. Even
without a jihadist accelerant, these shooters still might have killed.
Such attacks are not easily prevented. Violent ideologies will
continue to inspire violent behavior. Counter-radicalization programs
are worth considering, as long as they don't lead to government
attempts to patrol ideologies and dictate personal beliefs. And as we
have often seen in the United States, violent behavior may occur
without ideological reinforcement. The mental health problems that were
present in some of the recent terrorist attacks indicate that, in a
sense, the terrorists are not that far from the other shooters who have
appeared in our society.
Intelligence agencies are never omniscient, even in police states.
Firearms are available, and crude explosive devices can be improvised.
Instructions are available on the Internet, but decades ago, similar
instruction manuals were readily available at any library or bookstore,
and terrorists then built better bombs than they do now.
Have we as a government and as a nation adjusted over the past 15
years--militarily, politically, and mentally--so that we can make more
rational and effective decisions to mitigate the evolving threats?
I believe we have, militarily and politically. Mentally, in my
view, we have not. American society is obsessed with security. Our only
question is, Are we safer now? That is the perspective of victimhood.
It reflects fear and apprehension. According to recent public opinion
polls\3\, Americans today fear terrorist attacks as much as they did
immediately after 9/11. Yet the data show that the terrorist threat has
been diminished, if not eliminated, and the level of risk to individual
citizens is minuscule.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\3\ ``Terrorism in the United States,'' Gallup, 2016.
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We have to accept that countering terrorism will be an enduring
task, but we need not cower in fear of defeat or domination by Islamic
radicals. Instead of fueling fear or overpromising security, we should
call upon the traditional American attributes of being tough-minded,
showing true grit, and sticking together in the face of threats. Our
common defense will come, as it always has, from our collective
courage.
Mr. Langevin. As we look back to the state of our national security
15 years ago, I believe that we are safer from the type of orchestrated
attack that shocked us all on September 11, 2001. However, I am
concerned that we have not plugged some of the security gaps that still
threaten us today--gaps that led to the attacks in San Bernardino and
Orlando, for example--and I worry that the progress of those who wish
to do us harm has outpaced our ability to defend against nontraditional
threats. Do you believe that we as a government and as a nation have
adjusted over the past 15 years--militarily, politically, and
mentally--so that we can make more rational and effective decisions to
mitigate the evolving threats before us?
Colonel Price. Unfortunately, as long as we choose to live in a
free society where civil liberties like free speech and freedom from
illegal searches and seizures exist, terrorists will always have an
upper hand. With that said, I believe our government has made great
strides over the past 15 years to improve our ability to mitigate these
nontraditional threats. Although it is always possible to improve how
we collect, analyze, and act on intelligence and employ military means
to mitigate the threat, the two largest growth areas for improving our
counterterrorism efforts, in my opinion, lie in governance and public
resilience. Speaking to the former, the same socio-political dynamics
which helped give rise to the resurgence of the Islamic State and other
jihadists groups in the region are very much still in play. One of the
critical lessons learned over the past 15 years, in my opinion, is that
our (e.g. U.S. and the West more broadly) ability to affect those
socio-political dynamics in other countries has been and continues to
be significantly limited. Additionally, the government can do more to
educate the public on the terrorist threat currently facing the United
States today. If our civil liberties are to remain status quo, we can
reasonably expect to see more low-level, unsophisticated attacks
conducted by those inspired by jihadist narratives, such as the attacks
in San Bernardino, Orlando, New Jersey/New York, and more recently,
Ohio State in the months and years ahead. In addition to investing more
in countering violent extremism (CVE) programs, the government should
invest in ways the United States can assist other countries in the
region to offer more credible and alternative government structures
than that of the Islamic State. Rhetoric is not enough. Improvements to
our military CT efforts will only be seen on the margins, while
improvements in governance and public resiliency should be major growth
areas for U.S. CT moving forward. While we are safer from another
catastrophic attack like the one we suffered on 9/11, due in large part
to the improvements we have made across the board in our
counterterrorism efforts, we are certainly not safe from the jihadist
threat. I would not agree with the statement that our enemies have
outpaced our ability to defend against nontraditional threats. I would
offer, however, that our constitutional rights make it harder to defend
against terrorism, a point that I do not believe is articulated very
well to the public.