[House Hearing, 114 Congress]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office]
U.S. COUNTERTERRORISM EFFORTS IN SYRIA:
A WINNING STRATEGY?
=======================================================================
HEARING
BEFORE THE
SUBCOMMITTEE ON TERRORISM, NONPROLIFERATION, AND TRADE
OF THE
COMMITTEE ON FOREIGN AFFAIRS
HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES
ONE HUNDRED FOURTEENTH CONGRESS
FIRST SESSION
__________
SEPTEMBER 29, 2015
__________
Serial No. 114-101
__________
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COMMITTEE ON FOREIGN AFFAIRS
EDWARD R. ROYCE, California, Chairman
CHRISTOPHER H. SMITH, New Jersey ELIOT L. ENGEL, New York
ILEANA ROS-LEHTINEN, Florida BRAD SHERMAN, California
DANA ROHRABACHER, California GREGORY W. MEEKS, New York
STEVE CHABOT, Ohio ALBIO SIRES, New Jersey
JOE WILSON, South Carolina GERALD E. CONNOLLY, Virginia
MICHAEL T. McCAUL, Texas THEODORE E. DEUTCH, Florida
TED POE, Texas BRIAN HIGGINS, New York
MATT SALMON, Arizona KAREN BASS, California
DARRELL E. ISSA, California WILLIAM KEATING, Massachusetts
TOM MARINO, Pennsylvania DAVID CICILLINE, Rhode Island
JEFF DUNCAN, South Carolina ALAN GRAYSON, Florida
MO BROOKS, Alabama AMI BERA, California
PAUL COOK, California ALAN S. LOWENTHAL, California
RANDY K. WEBER SR., Texas GRACE MENG, New York
SCOTT PERRY, Pennsylvania LOIS FRANKEL, Florida
RON DeSANTIS, Florida TULSI GABBARD, Hawaii
MARK MEADOWS, North Carolina JOAQUIN CASTRO, Texas
TED S. YOHO, Florida ROBIN L. KELLY, Illinois
CURT CLAWSON, Florida BRENDAN F. BOYLE, Pennsylvania
SCOTT DesJARLAIS, Tennessee
REID J. RIBBLE, Wisconsin
DAVID A. TROTT, Michigan
LEE M. ZELDIN, New York
TOM EMMER, MinnesotaUntil 5/18/
15 deg.
DANIEL DONOVAN, New YorkAs
of 5/19/15 deg.
Amy Porter, Chief of Staff Thomas Sheehy, Staff Director
Jason Steinbaum, Democratic Staff Director
------
Subcommittee on Terrorism, Nonproliferation, and Trade
TED POE, Texas, Chairman
JOE WILSON, South Carolina WILLIAM KEATING, Massachusetts
DARRELL E. ISSA, California BRAD SHERMAN, California
PAUL COOK, California BRIAN HIGGINS, New York
SCOTT PERRY, Pennsylvania JOAQUIN CASTRO, Texas
REID J. RIBBLE, Wisconsin ROBIN L. KELLY, Illinois
LEE M. ZELDIN, New York
C O N T E N T S
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Page
WITNESSES
General Jack Keane, USA, Retired, chairman of the board,
Institute for the Study of War................................. 5
Mr. Thomas Joscelyn, senior fellow, Foundation for Defense of
Democracies.................................................... 14
The Honorable Daniel Benjamin, Norman E. McCulloch Jr. director,
John Sloan Dickey Center for International Understanding,
Dartmouth College (former Coordinator for Counterterrorism,
U.S. Department of State)...................................... 27
LETTERS, STATEMENTS, ETC., SUBMITTED FOR THE HEARING
General Jack Keane, USA, Retired: Prepared statement............. 8
Mr. Thomas Joscelyn: Prepared statement.......................... 17
The Honorable Daniel Benjamin: Prepared statement................ 29
APPENDIX
Hearing notice................................................... 50
Hearing minutes.................................................. 51
U.S. COUNTERTERRORISM EFFORTS IN SYRIA: A WINNING STRATEGY?
----------
TUESDAY, SEPTEMBER 29, 2015
House of Representatives,
Subcommittee on Terrorism, Nonproliferation, and Trade,
Committee on Foreign Affairs,
Washington, DC.
The subcommittee met, pursuant to notice, at 2 o'clock
p.m., in room 2172 Rayburn House Office Building, Hon. Ted Poe
(chairman of the subcommittee) presiding.
Mr. Poe. The subcommittee will come to order. Without
objection, all members may have 5 days to submit statements,
questions, and extraneous materials for the record subject to
the length limitation in the rules.
I will make my opening statement, then yield to the ranking
member, Mr. Keating, for his statement.
On September 10th, 2014, President Obama announced that the
United States would ``degrade and ultimately destroy ISIS.''
That was a year ago. Obviously, ISIS didn't get the memo. The
terrorist group keeps on moving across the Middle East killing
those who stand in its way by raping, pillaging, and murdering
those who disagree with ISIS.
ISIS controls half of Syria and large parts of Iraq.
Civilized society is losing to these barbarians. Despite the
U.S. spending billions in a counterterrorism strategy, the
terrorist groups numbers have not decreased; in fact, ISIS has
grown in size with affiliates now all over the world, including
Indonesia, Yemen, Egypt, and Libya.
The U.S. $3.7 billion air strike campaign has been plagued
with little measurable successful results. From the very
beginning, military officials warned that the air strikes
relied on virtually no human intelligence on the ground
surveillance. They were right. Without good intelligence, the
number of air strikes the U.S. has carried out have been few,
and the results are uncertain. Also, ISIS fighters killed by
our air strikes seem to be replaced immediately with other
jihadists.
Our intelligence estimates that ISIS' numbers are the same
as they were when the air strikes started. In addition, the
administration's $500 million Train and Equip Program has
proved to be a failure by anyone's measure. In July, officials
reported they had identified 7,000 planned participants, but
only trained 60 due to intense vetting procedures, and other
excuses.
Later that month, 54 fighters crossed into Syria to fight
ISIS forces that numbered in the tens of thousands. Of those 54
mercenaries, virtually all were killed, captured, or scattered
when attacked. We're now down to four or five trained
mercenaries according to General Lloyd Austin of CENTCOM.
Despite this failed policy, just last week we sent a second
group of about 70 U.S.-trained fighters into Syria. Just 1 day
later, reports suggested that one of the officers defected and
surrendered his arms to an al-Qaeda Syrian affiliate. Several
truckloads of weapons were allegedly traded to the terrorist
group al-Nusra for safe passage through Syria. It's time to
abandoned this failed Train and Equip Program.
The reality is just as bleak on the online battlefield.
ISIS has 30 to 40,000 social media accounts. It uses the
internet to spread its propaganda, raise money, and find
recruits as far away as Washington State. In 2011, the
administration promised a strategy to combat terrorists' use of
social media. Four years later, the administration still has
not shown us that strategy; no plan, no degrading of ISIS, no
defeating of ISIS.
The intel given to the administration has also reportedly
been doctored to cover up how bad the war against ISIS is
really going. Meanwhile, thousands of people are fleeing the
Middle East, flooding Europe, and demanding entry into other
Western countries because of the ISIS carnage and chaos in
Syria and Iraq. There is more. ISIS continues to recruit want-
to-be jihadists online for free via U.S.-owned social media
companies.
The administration continually is saying that everything is
okay, is an embarrassing and wrong assessment of the violence
and threat of ISIS. Today, we are here to get frank assessment
of the administration's counterterrorism strategy in Syria. In
the face of our failure to destroy ISIS, we should be focusing
on what we can do better, how we can improve our strategy in
the future.
ISIS' advances in Syria translate into more direct threats
to our national security and our interests both home and
abroad. ISIS wants to destroy the United States and everything
the U.S. stands for. ISIS fears no one; certainly not the U.S.,
so it continues to murder in the name of its radical jihadist
beliefs. It has already killed numerous Americans. We need a
strategy that protects American people from this radical
Islamic threat. Now we hear on the horizon that the Russians
may intervene and help defeat ISIS. Who knows?
The U.S. needs to define the enemy and defeat it. And
that's the way it is, and I'll yield to the ranking member, Mr.
Keating.
Mr. Keating. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, for conducting this
hearing, and I thank also our witnesses for being here today.
The conflict in Syria is an open wound in the volatile
Middle East. President Assad has brutalized, bombed, used
chemical weapons on his own people creating the conditions for
ISIL and al-Qaeda to thrive in Syria, and driving millions of
Syrians to flee their country. The resulting refugee crisis has
severely strained the resources of Syria's neighbors and
exposing divides in Europe, which in some parts is already
suffering from an intolerant brand of nationalism.
The conflict in Syria is also drawing in foreign fighters
who contribute to the instability and represent possible
terrorist threats when they return to their countries of
origin, including the United States. To put it mildly, the
order of battle in Syria is complex.
The United States has called for Assad to leave power and
opposes ISIL and al-Qaeda affiliate, al-Nusra. The United
States supports so-called moderate Syrian opposition forces and
the Syrian Kurdish group known as YPG. Meanwhile, our NATO
ally, Turkey, late to the fight against ISIL opposes Assad and
Kurdish militants, and the PKK, as well, which also has close
ties to our Syrian Kurdish allies, the YPG. Our sometimes
allies against ISIL, Iraq, Iran, and Russian support the Assad
regime, and our partners in Saudi Arabia and the Gulf States
oppose Assad and ISIL, while some individuals within these
states provide funding to Sunni extremist groups in Syria.
Given this tangled regional situation which has been
further complicated by Russia's recent movement of military
equipment and personnel into Syria, the United States has, in
my view, wisely refrained from introducing sizeable ground
force into Syria to combat ISIL. Yet, in concert with our
partners we must do more to counter and defeat ISIL which
controls significant territory in Syria and Iraq, extending its
influence beyond the Middle East into Africa and Asia.
ISIL's atrocities are horrific, and we must work to put a
stop to its campaign of murder, slavery, and the destruction of
cultural heritage. By virtue of its ideology, ISIL needs to
control territory in order to survive, and to ultimately defeat
ISIL we need to assist our allies in the region in retaking
that territory.
The key questions in my mind are, how will the United
States and its partners sufficiently array its forces against
ISIL to defeat it? And as we work to do this, how will we deal
with the Assad regime whose illegitimacy and brutality was the
root cause of the Syrian civil war?
We know that to date the plan to train and equip moderate
Syrian fighters has not met its objectives. I hope that today's
hearing will provide some constructive proposals on how going
forward the United States and its allies can enhance
counterterrorism efforts in Syria.
I yield back, Mr. Chair.
Mr. Poe. Thank the gentleman from Massachusetts.
The Chair recognizes the gentleman from South Carolina, Mr.
Wilson, for 1 minute.
Mr. Wilson. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Sadly, the President's strategy in Syria is failing,
resulting in refugees fleeing violence and then drowning at
sea. According to a recent article in the New York Times, the
administration reports,
``That coalition strikes killed about 10,000 Islamic
State fighters. The group continues to replenish its
ranks drawing an average of about 1,000 new fighters
per month.''
The President was wrong to belittle ISIS to JV, and he was
wrong and made a mockery of the term ``red line.'' The failure
of the Train and Equip mission of Syrian Opposition Forces has
given enemy reinforcements space to insert itself and prop up
the Assad dictatorship.
The U.S. needs to change course and create a new strategy
to defeat safe havens threatening American families at home. I
believe it's important that the U.S. and international
community recognize that the situation in Iraq and Syria is, in
fact, a global problem requiring broad international
cooperation to promote stability in the region for families to
prosper in their home nation.
Mr. Poe. The gentleman yields back his time.
The Chair recognizes the gentleman from California, Mr.
Sherman, for 1-minute opening statement.
Mr. Sherman. No one in the administration is saying that
everything is okay. The Shiite Alliance is more dangerous than
ISIS and more evil. They've killed far more Americans starting
in the 1980s when Hezbollah attacked our Marines. And so if we
confront ISIS, we have to do so in a way that does not empower
Assad, Hezbollah, and Iran.
You can attack U.S. policy, but we don't as a nation want
to send troops into the ground, and we are living with the
results of an absolutely failed policy of the last
administration in Iraq which installed Maliki, slightly
improved now with al-Abadi. The fact is, the Iraqi Government
betrayed us this week in entering into a special intelligence
alliance with Iran, Assad, and Russia.
The Train and Equip Program has been a failure. Due to
political correctness, we have not armed those we know are not
Islamic extremists; namely, the Yazidis and the Christians. And
due to diplomatic correctness, we have not armed the Kurds
directly, but try to put everything through Baghdad. That does
not mean we should abandon the Train and Equip Program, which
should have begun much earlier, as many on this committee
argued, because what is the alternative? The chairman tells us
we must defeat ISIS. Whose ground troops are going to do that,
and what is a plan other than the administration's plan, poorly
carried out in the case of the Train and Equip Program, that
will allow us to achieve that goal without massive American
casualties.
I yield back.
Mr. Poe. The gentleman's time has expired.
The Chair recognizes the gentleman from Pennsylvania, Mr.
Perry, for 1 minute.
Mr. Perry. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
In spite of its shortcomings, and there are many, the last
administration's policy was not completely failed, and I would
submit that the failure was after that President left, and with
the advent of the new policy.
To that effect, in his September 2014 address from the
White House, President Obama laid out a plan to degrade and
ultimately destroy ISIL through a comprehensive and sustained
counterterrorism strategy. In Syria, this goal was to be
achieved with two major policies; a systematic campaign of air
strikes and increased support to forces fighting the Islamic
State on the ground.
A year later, what does this strategy currently look like?
Eleven sorties per day yielding an average of 43 bombs dropped
daily, a handful of Syrian rebels who would rather be fighting
Assad at a cost of about $100 million to the American taxpayer.
According to a report published recently by the Syrian
Observatory for Human Rights, ISIS has extended its territorial
reach and now controls 50 percent of Syria, including most of
the country's oil wells which have proven to be a significant
source of revenue.
Mr. Chairman, I think it is high time this administration
go back to the drawing board.
I yield back.
Mr. Poe. The gentleman yields back his time.
The Chair recognizes the gentleman, Mr. Rohrabacher, for 1
minute.
Mr. Rohrabacher. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman.
This administration has managed to turn a bad situation,
which it did inherit, which was a bad situation that we created
on this side of the aisle by going along with the President who
precipitously invaded Iraq at a time when he hadn't finished in
Afghanistan, but that bad situation this administration
inherited has been turned into a catastrophe of this
administration's making.
U.S. policies, even our supplies sent to defeat ISIL are
now in the possession of radical Islamic groups that intend on
killing Americans and other people who believe in our Western
values. This administration has found every excuse to undermine
the governments and the forces that are most friendly to our
cause and the cause of peace.
In Syria, we refused to cooperate with Russia 5 years ago
claiming that there was an alternative, and what happened in
those 5 years? It's turned into an ever-worse situation, and
the money that was sent over to arm a Third Force we now find
has been used to train and equip hostile forces to those people
who are trying to bring peace to the Middle East.
Thank you for holding this hearing; looking forward to
getting the details.
Mr. Poe. The gentleman yields back.
The Chair will now recognize and introduce all three of our
witnesses. Thank you, gentlemen, for being here.
General Jack Keane is the chairman of the board at the
Institute of the Study of War. General Keane is a retired four-
star general and the former vice-chief of staff for the United
States Army.
Mr. Thomas Joscelyn is a senior fellow at the Foundation
for Defense of Democracies, and senior editor of The Long War
Journal, a publication dealing with counterterrorism and
related issues.
And Ambassador Daniel Benjamin is director of the John
Sloan Dickey Center for International Understanding at
Dartmouth. Ambassador Benjamin previously served as Ambassador-
at-Large and coordinator for the counterterrorism at the United
States State Department.
Thank you, gentlemen, for being here. General Keane, we'll
start with you.
STATEMENT OF GENERAL JACK KEANE, USA, RETIRED, CHAIRMAN OF THE
BOARD, INSTITUTE FOR THE STUDY OF WAR
General Keane. Thank you, Chairman Poe, Ranking Member
Keating, distinguished members of the committee for inviting me
back today. I'm honored to be here with my distinguished panel
colleagues.
The Middle East has experienced one of the most tumultuous
periods in its history with the old order challenged by the
aspirational goals of the Arab Spring, Islamic terrorists
taking advantage of this political and social upheaval, and
Iran using proxies to achieve regional influence and control.
ISIS has become the most successful terrorist organization
in modern history by dominating a large swath of Syrian-Iraq
territory while expanding its formal affiliations into seven
countries, and developing a worldwide following.
As you mentioned, Mr. Chairman, approximately a year ago,
the President announced U.S. policy that in conjunction with
our Coalition partners we would degrade, and ultimately defeat
ISIS. While there has been some progress, looking at this
strategy today, we now know the conceptual plan of Iraq first
and minimal commitment in Syria is fundamentally flawed. The
resources provided to support Iraq and Syria are far from
adequate. The indigenous ground forces in Syria and Iraq are
not capable of defeating ISIS. The air campaign rules of
engagement are too restrictive. We have not impacted the
ideology or ISIS recruiting as 28,000 new recruits have arrived
this year alone. As such, we are not only failing, we are
losing this war. I can say with certainty our strategy will not
defeat ISIS.
ISIS, who is headquartered in Syria, recruits, trains, and
re-supplies in Syria. It is from Syria that ISIS has so
successfully expanded, and it is from Syria that ISIS reaches
out to 20,000 social media sites per day. They control large
swaths of territory in Syria from Iraq border to Damascus. This
territorial control is what differentiates it from other
terrorist organizations, but it is also its greatest
vulnerability.
To defeat ISIS, we must take its territory away, as we did
with Germany, Japan, and Korea; yet, we have no strategy to
defeat ISIS in Syria. We have no effective ground force, which
is a defeat mechanism. Air power will not defeat ISIS; it has
not even been able to deny ISIS the ability to attack at will.
ISIS grew to a terrorist army only because of the sanctuary in
Syria. We cannot succeed in Iraq if ISIS is allowed to exist in
Syria.
The United States finds itself at a critical juncture with
its ISIS strategy failing, the Syrian civil war in its fourth
year, and because the Assad regime this last year has been
losing ground to the rebels and some political support,
Vladimir Putin is executing a military buildup in Syria to
insure the survival of the Assad regime. Putin is also working
to create an alternative anti-ISIS Coalition that includes
Russia, Iran, Syria, and Iraq in a direct challenge to the
U.S.-led Coalition.
In view of these very real challenges, what can we do? As
to the strategy, Sun Tzu said, ``Tactics without a strategy is
the noise before defeat,'' and we have some noise.
Once and for all, 22 years after the first World Trade
Center bombing, 14 years after 9/11, we should develop in
conjunction with our allies a comprehensive strategy to defeat
radical Islam. Otherwise, we will continue to react to
individual terrorist movements, al-Qaeda, ISIS, Ansar al-
Sharia, Boko Haram, you name it, with no end in sight.
As to Syria, recognizing an effective ground force is the
key to defeating ISIS with much less restrictive use of air
power. The ground force should consist of the Syria Kurds, the
only force who has enjoyed success against ISIS in Syria. This
force should be armed as required, and provided special forces
advisors to assist with the use of air power.
Despite the dismal failure of the Train and Equip mission
of the moderate Sunni Arab Force, I agree with Mr. Sherman, it
is still essential to put together this vital capability. The
parameters for this force must change. We cannot restrict the
Sunni Syrian Arabs to exclusively fighting ISIS, when their
priority is the Assad regime who is destroying their
communities and killing their families. They want to fight the
Assad regime and ISIS; let them.
Also, this force and their communities must be protected as
should the Syria Kurds. Begin by establishing free zones in the
north and south, use Coalition air power to include the Turks
to enforce it, and permit the people to use the free zone as a
sanctuary. Advise Assad if he challenges the free zone, then
U.S.-led Coalition will shut down his air power.
We must step up the use of our special operations forces to
conduct routine ground raids, not just limited to drone raids.
But the harsh reality is that the Syrian Kurds and the Sunni
Arabs may not be sufficient to dislodge ISIS and defeat them in
Syria. And the task may ultimately require an outside Arab
coalition assisted by the United States ground and air
components.
As to Assad, while the United States and the Coalition
desires a political solution to the Syrian civil war, recognize
that Assad will never depart unless the military momentum
shifts against him. Despite Russia's military pressure, this
should still be U.S. policy.
As to Russia, once again, Putin is outmaneuvering the
United States, and once again he will out-bluff us. Putin's
economy is in the tank. His financial reserves are running out.
His military is no match against the United States. He has
deployed a relatively small military and limited capability to
Syria; yet, he will likely get what he wants, the preservation
of the Assad regime.
The United States should not coordinate any military
operations with Russia. To do so, we are de facto in collusion
with the Syrian regime, Iran, the Quds Force, and Hezbollah.
Putin is counting on President Obama's fear of escalation, and
fear of confrontation to force U.S. capitulation to Russia's
ambition in Syria, and the Middle East at large. This, in my
view, is a game changer.
There are no easy answers in Syria, but we don't have the
luxury to say it's too hard, and it's too complicated. There
have been plenty of mistakes and lost opportunities to be sure,
but U.S. interests, U.S. security, and U.S. credibility is at
stake. What is most needed now is U.S. determined leadership
and resolve to commit to defeating ISIS along with a revised
effective strategy.
Thank you, and I look forward to your questions.
[The prepared statement of General Keane follows:]
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----------
Mr. Poe. Thank you. Mr. Joscelyn.
STATEMENT OF MR. THOMAS JOSCELYN, SENIOR FELLOW, FOUNDATION FOR
DEFENSE OF DEMOCRACIES
Mr. Joscelyn. Chairman Poe, Ranking Member Keating, and
other members of the committee, thank you for inviting me here
today to speak about our counterterrorism efforts in Syria.
As others have already said, the war is exceedingly
complex. I'm not going to pretend to have all the answers for
you, but I've heard a few things here already which are
consistent with my testimony. I want to highlight them in my
oral testimony.
First is sort of the necessity of removing territory from
the Islamic State or ISIS. The Kurds have done a good job this
year taking the northern third of Raqqah Province away from the
Islamic State, but as David Ignatius in the Washington Post
recently reported, they've been basically under-resourced, and
for some reason there's a holdup in getting more resources to
take that fight to Islamic State. I don't know why that is;
however, that seems to be the case.
In that vein, I would say that the founding mythos of the
Islamic State is that it is the resurrection of the Caliphate.
They brought this back to being a reality on this earth. And I
think that as long as that myth exists and lives, that
basically we're going to keep seeing more recruitment, we're
going to keep seeing more people flock to the Caliphate. Now,
you're going to have some people who defect, and who aren't
happy, and who go home, and we need to trumpet their messages.
But as long as this founding myth that they are the Caliphate
and control territory exists, they're going to keep going.
And to that point, this morning the Treasury Department
released what I think is really unprecedented; 35 terrorist
designations at once this morning. Most of the designations
deal with the Islamic State and underscore the degree to which
the Islamic State has mushroomed. They deal with the Islamic
State's provinces in the in the Khorasan and the Caucus
Province, also the Islamic State's growing presence in the
Sinai. And also, most importantly, deals with western recruits
have gone to the Islamic State and posed some level of threat
to their home countries.
Now, the plots that have been, I think, highlighted in
these designations aren't necessarily 9/11 style plots. These
aren't these sort of spectacular events that we should all be
worried about, but it shows that there is at least the seed of
an idea of attacking their home countries there with some of
the individuals who were designated this morning.
One quick point to something Mr. Sherman said about Iran
and Assad. I think even taking it a step further, I think that
they actually are the fundamental destabilizing force in the
region, and have actually fueled Sunni jihadism. Just last
month, as we reported in The Long War Journal, the Islamic
State brutally executed four members of the popular
mobilization forces in Iraq. They did so in a manner that was
consistent with the way the Shiite extremists had previously
executed Sunnis who they were fighting. And too oftentimes in
our media coverage, we get the ISIS video which is sort of, you
know, glossy and highly stylized, and something that's really
there for the wow factor, but not enough attention is given to
what's happening on the Shiite side which is really driving
this. And, unfortunately, as long as Shiite extremism is
expanding, what that does is it forces Sunnis more into the
radicals camps, more into the jihadist camps, and that's not a
good thing. Obviously, that underscores the idea that in the
long run, Assad and Iran are not an answer to this at all.
One further threat stream that I want to highlight today,
and this goes to a lot of what we work on. I think it's very
poorly misunderstood, is the al-Nusra Front, and the Sunni
jihadists in Syria who are not aligned with the Islamic State,
and who are actually opposed to them. I think they're
actually--there's a gross misunderstanding of what they're
doing, because what you don't hear often is that they are
actually building their own state in northern Syria, and
particularly in the Idlib Province.
The al-Nusra Front is openly loyal to Ayman al-Zawahiri,
the head of al-Qaeda. It is seeded with senior al-Qaeda
operatives, some of whom have actually trained, and lived, and
worked with al-Qaeda going back to the 1980s. In a recent
video, they highlighted the 9/11 attacks as something that's
part of their legacy and their heritage, and say that this is
part of--they're the heirs of this glory. And their videos and
propaganda show very clearly that al-Qaeda actually seeks to
build an Islamic State or Emirate as well in Syria. This is
absolutely without a doubt.
And, in fact, is you look at the Train and Equip Program,
the recent problems with it, I think this is another fact that
needs to be highlighted. The problems came not from ISIS, the
problems came from al-Nusra Front or al-Qaeda, going back to
July when members of Division 30 went into Syria into the
Aleppo Province, it was al-Nusra that was waiting for them
that, as you said, Chairman Poe, killed, and captured, and
basically disbanded this group very quickly. We were not
expecting that for some reason on the U.S. side.
Now just recently we have now an admission from CENTCOM
saying that, in fact, several vehicles and ammunition at a
minimum were turned over to al-Nusra Front in northern Syria,
not ISIS, as part of a deal that was brokered to basically
guarantee safe passage for some of the people who were somehow
affiliated with this program.
I think this highlights to a certain extent that there's
such a myopic focus on the Islamic State, and such a drive to
say the Islamic State is really the only threat we have to be
worried about here, that basically a lot of times what's
actually happening with these other groups is just as
important, if not more so in the long run.
And finally I'll say this, there's been somewhat of a
public relations campaign to get the West to support or at
least tactically support some of the Sunni jihadists in Syria,
including Ahrar al-Sham. That is a horrible idea. Members of
the Obama administration have actually openly objected to that
idea and said that's a no-go. They are right in that regard.
Ahrar al-Sham should in no way be our partner in Syria. They
cannot be. This is a group that openly says that the Mullah
Omar's Taliban is a model for what they're building in Syria.
It is deeply allied with al-Qaeda in Syria. It's had senior al-
Qaeda veterans implanted in its ranks, and seeded in its ranks.
This is a group that is absolutely not worthy of our support,
and so I will end on a final warning; which is that the Sunni
jihadists who are not Islamic State, and are not affiliated,
and are actually against Assad, a lot of these groups are not
our allies.
[The prepared statement of Mr. Joscelyn follows:]
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----------
Mr. Poe. Thank you, Mr. Joscelyn.
The Chair now recognizes Ambassador Benjamin.
STATEMENT OF THE HONORABLE DANIEL BENJAMIN, NORMAN E. MCCULLOCH
JR. DIRECTOR, JOHN SLOAN DICKEY CENTER FOR INTERNATIONAL
UNDERSTANDING, DARTMOUTH COLLEGE (FORMER COORDINATOR FOR
COUNTERTERRORISM, U.S. DEPARTMENT OF STATE)
Ambassador Benjamin. Chairman Poe, members of the
subcommittee--is that better? Begin again.
Chairman Poe, Ranking Member Keating, distinguished members
of the subcommittee, thank you for the opportunity to appear
today to discuss the important issue of counterterrorism in
Syria.
Many have spoken of Syria as the problem from hell. Today
with upwards of \1/4\ million dead, more than 4 million Syrians
in exile, a crisis in Europe and in Syria's neighborhood, and
almost 8 million internally displaced, one can only say that
Syria has descended to a lower and darker circle of hell. And
as many have mentioned, from an American perspective, the
enduring safe haven that has been created in Syria and in Iraq
is an outstanding problem for U.S. security.
This hearing, moreover, comes at a moment of dangerous flux
with the deployment of substantial numbers of Russian forces to
Syria, and that appears to be a game changer for Western
strategy. I think it's unlikely now that there will be any
chance of removing Bashar al-Assad's regime, or of the regime
being pressured to come to the negotiating table on terms that
it finds inhospitable.
And I believe that it's important to look at the regional
context, as well. While a diplomatic solution will have to be
found, and there is no military solution has been said over and
over again, we face a potential another round of flux followed
by equilibrium at a higher level of violence with Sunni powers
in the region supporting their proxies to fight against Assad,
now backed by the Russians. And that, in turn, could raise the
stakes from a counterterrorism perspective, as well.
It is a moment for innovative diplomacy, and I would just
say that I share the view that we need to show more flexibility
on the issue of the fate of the Assad government. And while,
ultimately, a leader has committed the atrocities on the scale
that Bashar al-Assad has, cannot be allowed to stay in power,
humanitarian and counterterrorism concerns demand that we be
flexible about the modalities of that departure.
As others have noted, the key shortcoming in Syria and Iraq
remains the absence of a capable ground force which is
essential for achieving the kind of success against ISIL that
we seek to achieve. Here there are two critical problems; what
has been mentioned, the weak showing on Equip and Train needs
no further discussion here. But, equally, I think it's
important to understand again the regional context, which is
that our Coalition partners are far from engaged in this
struggle as seriously as we would like. While Western allies
are showing growing commitment, and we should all welcome
France's decision to launch air strikes against targets in
Syria, the Saudis and the smaller Gulf States remain
principally interested in the sectarian conflict and Exhibit A
in that regard is the conflict of Yemen, where a humanitarian
catastrophe is also unfolding. And Saudi Arabia's determination
to extirpate the Houthis in Yemen is receiving far more
attention and resources than the effort to roll back ISIL and
Sunni extremism.
Our and our allies' agendas are at odds, and that is going
to be a continuing problem in this extraordinarily difficult
situation. But that said, I still think that the strategy we
have, while hardly ideal is the best one available to us. For
all its grotesque violence, ISIL has not yet manifested itself
as a first tier terrorist threat to the United States. It has
not yet shown significant interest in out-of-area attacks. I
believe that will change the more we bomb them, but for the
time being, I don't think they can be said to be an al-Qaeda-
like threat. They have not devoted the effort to long distance
covert operations the way al-Qaeda did.
Much has been made about the threat of foreign fighters. I
would point out that there's only been one case so far of a
foreign fighter coming back to his home country and carrying
out an attack. That was in Brussels. We see an awful lot of
radicalization young individuals who want to be part of the
team, want to show that they are part of this historic
movement, but this kind of violence which remains low-level,
and I would say non-existential, certainly, is the new normal
in jihadist terrorism. It's not something to sniff at, but it
is certainly less threatening than the catastrophic attacks we
feared after 9/11.
I agree with Mr. Joscelyn about the importance of the myth
of the Caliphate and holding territory. That has galvanized
lots of extremists, but I would suggest that we have a number
of tools at our disposal. We are seeing an accelerating
campaign of drone and other air strikes that are taking our
senior officials of ISIL. And I believe that over time this
will throw the group off balance and make it harder for them to
achieve their military or their state-building objectives. And
I think over time that will also make a ground campaign more
attractive to some of our allies who we hope will get involved.
I remain strongly opposed to putting U.S. boots on the
ground. This would be repetition of the surge, and would only
address symptoms and not the causes. I have a lot more to say,
but I look forward to your questions.
[The prepared statement of Ambassador Benjamin follows:]
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----------
Mr. Poe. I thank the gentleman. I recognize myself for 5
minutes for questions.
Is it in our national security interest that ISIS be
defeated? General?
General Keane. Yes, absolutely, in my judgment. I mean, we
are talking about--it is a national security interest for us
for stability and security in the Middle East. It is in our
national security interest dealing with our allies, obviously,
who are being impacted by ISIS. And I also believe that ISIS
left unattended will eventually become more of a direct threat
to the American people at large, and I think the evidence is
already there in terms of the fertility for something like to
take place. Certainly, there is the intent.
Mr. Poe. Ambassador Benjamin, did I hear you correct when--
did you say that Assad, he's going to stay in Syria? At some--
he'll be the leader, the President, whatever of a portion of
Syria, or not?
Ambassador Benjamin. Mr. Poe, first let me just say, I
fully agree that over the long term we want ISIL to be
defeated, but I think that the key here is strategic patience,
and that we should do it in a way that comports with our long-
term interests, and doesn't result in another mistaken
deployment.
As for Assad----
Mr. Poe. Strategic patience, does that mean that we'd let
ISIS get a pass for a few years, and----
Ambassador Benjamin. No, I think it means that we continue
striking them and we've now carried out roughly 6,000 air
strikes.
Mr. Poe. Are you saying those air strikes have been
successful in stopping ISIS?
Ambassador Benjamin. I think that they have done a good job
at containing ISIS. And I think that containment,
unfortunately, is the solution of the moment.
Mr. Poe. Do you agree with that, General Keane?
General Keane. No. Absolutely, that's not true. What has
happened, CENTCOM has chosen to use activity-based analysis to
provide some impact of what ISIS is doing. Therefore, we
receive information that says number of air attacks, number of
vehicles destroyed, and we haven't been counting bodies since
Vietnam, number of people killed. How we come to that
conclusion is beyond me.
What we're not doing in terms of the analysis that you're
not receiving, but it is inside the CENTCOM headquarters is a
matrix-based analysis that looks at the enemy and says how
effective is their command and control? What is their tactical
and operational initiative? What is their territorial control?
Has it gone up, gone down, where is it now? What is their
capability to regenerate forces? What degree of resiliency that
they have? All of those things I just mentioned, plus four or
five others, are all to the plus, which tells you that the air
campaign is not nearly as effective as it could be, and it
certainly is not having any significant impact on those
categories, which is the way we judge an enemy force.
Mr. Poe. Ambassador Benjamin, without going into that issue
more, I mean, I think the General is right, and you're wrong.
This is not defeating ISIS. I would think they would applaud
the same type of lack of strategy because they're expanding.
But answer my question; is Assad here to stay in Syria, or a
portion of Syria, now that the Russians are involved? Is that
what you said? I'm just asking that question.
Ambassador Benjamin. What I said, sir, was that over the
long term Assad needs to go. That, I believe, is consistent
with our values and the revulsion of the international
community, but that we should think hard about how we sequence
that, and whether or not we agree to let him, for example,
remain throughout his elected term in order to deal with the
fact that the Russians are simply not going to leave ahead of
time.
I also would point out, sir, that otherwise, we are right
now in a conflict in which we're fighting both sides from a
middle that doesn't exist.
Mr. Poe. More than one side. Reclaiming my time.
Now that the Russians are involved, Putin, Napoleon of
Siberia now moving into the area. You've got Russia, Assad,
Iran now working together. How does that issue impact our
strategy, lack of strategy, or a future strategy in defeating
ISIS? General, you want to try that?
General Keane. Certainly. Well, first of all, it is a
reality, but we should not let Putin and his limited military
capability that he's providing take us off what our strategy
is, which is to defeat ISIS and put together an effective
ground force in Syria to do that, and also do the same thing in
Iraq, and provide the number of resources that we need to do
that.
I would tell Mr. Putin that I'm going to fly my airplanes
where I want, when I want, I'm going to do what I want with
them, and you're not going to interfere with them period. I
mean, the idea of deconflicting operations with Putin is
ridiculous. There's no reason to do something like that. We
have to stand up for what our goals are in that country, in
Syria, and also in Iraq. Putin is playing a card here, and he's
gotten away with it in 2013 on the chemical weapons, he got
away with it in Crimea, and he got away with it in Ukraine. And
given that encouragement that we've provided him, he's playing
another one.
I do agree with this, Mr. Chairman, it does solidify what
was happening to the Assad regime. They were losing Alawites,
erosion of support not to the point where he was going to
removed, but it was eroding, and the rebels were gaining on
him, particularly in Idlib Province, and that was Jabhat al-
Nusra. And he knew that, and that sanctuary that they have,
that Alawite sanctuary was being threatened. The Iranians
provided him the detailed information on that because their
intelligence is better, and that's what this move is about, to
solidify the Assad regime. And that will happen to a certain
degree, but if we continue the momentum against the Assad
regime and support that, and support issues against ISIS, I
believe at some point we'll be able to work a deal to get Assad
out of there.
Mr. Poe. Thank you, General.
I yield to the ranking member, Mr. Keating from
Massachusetts.
Mr. Keating. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
I want to touch on one issue, and maybe get back to some of
the other issues we were discussing. I'll start with Ambassador
Benjamin. What's the role of Turkey, Turkey as an effective
partner? Within hours after the U.S. had an agreement with
Turkish officials to use the air force bases to launch air
strikes against ISIL, Turkey launched air strikes against PKK
in northern Iraq, the Syrian Kurdish group. And the YPG has
close ties to PKK, and is one of the most effective anti-ISIL
forces in Syria. Plus, although they're improving, I think
Turkey has also been one of the most--probably the most main
transit site for a country where fighters are flowing into
Syria now. What could we do to better work with Turkey? I think
it's critical that they become an effective partner for us.
Ambassador Benjamin. Well, it's critical that they become
an effective partner for us, but I would say the diplomacy with
Turkey is an extraordinarily vexed problem, Mr. Keating. And
Turkey has made clear that its number one priority is the
removal of Assad. And complicating that is that President
Erdogan has decided to essentially tack back against one of his
greatest achievement, which was ameliorating tensions between
Turks and Kurds in his own country by striking out against
Kurds for political gain. And while we do benefit from being
able to fly out of Incirlik now, we have an enormously
challenging problem because the Turks are dead set against
increased influence for the YPG, or any other Kurdish group
outside of Turkey. So, the diplomacy there is extraordinarily
difficult. And, again, the Turks are increasingly concerned
about ISIL, but they are nowhere nearly as concerned about ISIL
as they are about Assad, which has become an obsession. His
removal has become an obsession for Mr. Erdogan.
Mr. Keating. I couldn't agree--I was in Turkey just 4
months ago, and I agree with you that--in their hierarchy of
their concerns, Assad is first, the Kurds second, and ISIL may
be third maybe, so that creates a problem that I see. I don't
know if any of the other witnesses want to see how we could
better deal with Turkey, if that's possible at all.
Mr. Joscelyn. I'll echo Mr. Benjamin's honorable remarks
here about dealing with Turkey because I think diplomacy is
very difficult to deal with them.
I'll say this, Turkey--in my opening remarks I highlighted
Ahrar al-Sham as a group that's not our partner in Syria.
They're a member of the Jaysh al-Fatah Coalition which is led
by al-Nusra Front, which is al-Qaeda. Ahrar al-Sham fights hand
and glove with al-Qaeda, al-Nusra Front throughout all of
Syria. Ahrar al-Sham also happens to be Turkey's preferred
proxy in the fight in Syria, and this is a group we profiled.
I've probably written 100 articles on them about now in The
Long War Journal, and there's no doubt about what Ahrar al-Sham
is. This is a Sunni jihadist group that's aligned with al-
Qaeda. It's being set up to be basically the long run Taliban
in Syria. Basically, the al-Qaeda, at least pre-9/11, you think
about having these local Syrian forces that could basically be
a face for Sunni jihadism in Syria. That's Ahrar al-Sham is,
and Turkey is the number one backer at this point of Ahrar al-
Sham.
General Keane. The only thing I would add is, listen, all
the problems that Turkey has given us to be sure but,
nonetheless, in mid-July they came to an agreement with the
United States to establish, for want of another term, a free
zone with us, and to enforce that free zone using air power.
So, that is a beginning and a recognition that that will
provide some relief in terms of sanctuary relief for people who
need that measure of protection. And, of course, that serves
their self-interest in terms of migration across their border
with refugees, but it's also a way of protecting a ground
force. And I think that's a positive thing, it's something we
can work with.
Mr. Keating. General, I appreciate your going forward with
direct comments, but the difficulty I have trying to find out
how to follow-through deals with the use of ground troops, as
well. And you say that we have to have U.S. and our allies
engaged in those ground troops to be successful. Two things;
number one, how do we get our allies? The conversations I've
had are not encouraging with our Western allies participating.
Number two, let's assume we did, let's assume we were
successful. What do you see for the time frame of those ground
troops having to hold that territory?
General Keane. The issue we have, and you mentioned in a
discussion with the panel, is every one of our allies on the
border there, their number one issue is Assad. And it's not
that ISIS isn't important to them, but they want the focus to
be the removal of that regime and what it's been largely doing
to Sunnis, whose constituency is within their own countries.
And that's why I thought the more aggressive strategy in
dealing with Assad early on going back a few years, this is one
of the lost opportunities we had to build a capable force that
pretty much has gone by the wayside in a sense, because if you
remember, a national security team from this administration
offered that as an opportunity in the summer of 2012. We should
never lose that focus, because I don't think they will
participate as a ground force, an Arab Coalition ground force
as long as that regime is there. But when you talk to them,
once the removal of that regime, then they're willing to
entertain the thought of taking some kind of ground action
against ISIS, if it's still warranted at that time.
And I suspect, even though we should try some of these
other options, and I think the administration is looking at
some different options, I'm not certain those options are going
to be successful.
Mr. Keating. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Ambassador Benjamin was going to comment on this. I hope he
has the opportunity to do that with other questions.
I yield back.
Mr. Poe. The Chair recognizes the gentleman from
Pennsylvania, Mr. Perry.
Mr. Perry. Thanks, Mr. Chairman.
Mr. Joscelyn, what were the factors that led to the
complete failure of the original batch of U.S.-trained Syrian
fighters that crossed into the country from Syria in July, if
you know, from your perspective?
Mr. Joscelyn. What happened, and we were watching this,
ironically enough, on social media. Al-Qaeda, al-Nusra Front
has all sorts of social media accounts, and they basically were
taunting us as this was ongoing releasing a statement saying
that they had basically captured or killed a number of the
Division 30 forces they're called as they crossed into Aleppo
in northern Syria.
The problem here was that it wasn't thought based on press
reporting that, in fact, al-Qaeda in Syria was going to
interfere with an American-backed effort, which I think was
shortsighted. I don't know who made that call, or who made that
choice, but that's what it said in the press reporting. So, it
wasn't ISIS that interfered with us, it was al-Nusra Front or
al-Qaeda that did. And then quickly what they did was after
basically intercepting these guys as they were sent into Syria,
they then went and raided their headquarters north of Aleppo,
which we then--the U.S. then sent in air cover to try and kill
them, and actually probably killed dozens of al-Qaeda fighters
during the conflict. But the end result was that these 54
fighters that went into Syria were quickly disbanded.
Mr. Perry. I mean, 54 is a pretty--what was the force
opposed to them when they came in? Do you have any idea? I
mean, 54, I'm just----
Mr. Joscelyn. It's a drop in the bucket. I mean, the point
is----
Mr. Perry. You've got a platoon of fighters.
Mr. Joscelyn. I mean, Nusra Front by comparison, and this
wasn't even factored in the strategy, easily has thousands upon
thousands of jihadists now if you just look at their operations
on a day to day basis. And they're not even ISIS. And then you
go deal with ISIS and all the other factors there.
Mr. Perry. General Keane, in what ways do you believe the
recent Iran nuclear deal with affect counterterrorism efforts
in Syria? I know that's maybe a little bit of a stretch, but
can you draw a thread for us and put some points on it that we
can maybe see some milestones, if you can come up--if you can
think of some?
General Keane. Well, I think it's pretty self-evident. I
mean, the progress that the Iranians have made in the last 35
years using proxy clients to sponsor terrorism for them, and
also to execute military operations for them have led to
significant influence and control in Lebanon, Syria, Yemen, and
Iraq. And with close to $150 billion worth of funding that's
going to be returned to their coffers, which is a significant
percentage of their GDP, I think if we just estimate that
likely 20-30 percent go to domestic needs to appease a
population and keep them out of the streets, and most of it
will go to their number one strategic objective, is not a
nuclear weapon. Their number one strategic objective is to
dominate and control the region, and that is where that money
will go. And that will mean Hezbollah funding, it'll certainly
means Quds Force funding, both of who are on the ground in
Syria.
And I may say, making a significant contribution also on
the ground in Syria but no longer there, but helped prop up the
Assad regime before ISIS invaded Iraq was thousands of Iraqi
Shia militia that were all trained by the Iranians. So, that
will be the mainstay of where most of the money will go. It
will not just impact Syria, it'll impact other countries in the
region. But, certainly, it will have impact on Syria.
Mr. Perry. Keeping with that kind of a thought, the
implications of Russian forces in Syria, and especially in
light of the Assad regime's recent use of Russian warplanes to
carry out air strikes. You kind of talked about this briefly
before.
Do you believe the U.S. can still--do we have the resolve?
What are the implications, what are the challenges to us
instituting a no-fly zone should we chose to with the advent of
Russian forces proper being in country?
General Keane. Well, I think the free zone also would
obviously be a no-fly zone. We would not tolerate the Assad
regime bombing a free zone, so I think it's a--the no-fly zone
has a little bit of a third rail to this administration, so I
think a free zone is a better word. And, also, it's a place
where refugees can go to seek sanctuary.
But look, what----
Mr. Perry. Are we going to be mixing it up with Russian
planes? Are American fighter pilots going to be mixing it up
with----
General Keane. I don't see any reason why the Russians
would do something like that. They've got some intercept
airplanes, they're called SU-24s. They've got some multi-roll
fighters on the ground, and they've got some close air support
airplanes. They have about a squadron of fighters, they've got
about a squadron of Hinds and Hips, and they've got a half a
dozen drones. That's a limited air capability. They've got some
ground forces and some tanks, about a battalion size to sort of
protect the airbase and the greater airbase--and a base they're
forming north of that. That's not a power projective offensive
ground force. You push it out so you don't have Jabhat al-Nusra
lobbing mortars at their airbase and interfering with their
operations.
It is a limited military capability designed to have
significant political impact. And I believe it will have
significant political impact. He knows what he's doing.
Mr. Perry. Thank you, General. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Mr. Poe. The Chair recognizes the gentleman from
California.
Mr. Sherman. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
At the beginning, I said that the Shiite Alliance was more
dangerous, more evil, has killed more innocent Muslims, killed
more Americans than ISIS has. What I should point out, what I
failed to point out at the beginning of this, but ISIS is far
more gruesome. Assad will give 1,000 people with barrel bombs
and have the good taste to deny it. ISIS will behead a dozen
people and put it up on YouTube.
There have been those who have blamed the United States for
everything and said we've accomplished nothing. I would point
out for the record that ISIS was on its way to take Baghdad, at
least the Sunni neighborhoods in Baghdad, and it was American
air power that stopped them. Speaking of Baghdad, this is an
ally that may not be worthy of very much American support.
Ambassador, do you know how much money we spent propping up
that regime this year? We've got thousands of troops there, we
give them lots of free weapons. Any idea what the price is?
Ambassador Benjamin. I'm afraid I couldn't give----
Mr. Sherman. Okay. We'll try to find out for the record,
but this is a regime that has oil revenues present and future
that will not commit to repay us with future oil revenues. It's
a regime that sends money to ISIS, it pays the civil servants
in Mosul, which means they're giving money to people under ISIS
control, it I believe gives Mosul free electricity for which
ISIS can collect. But, most importantly, ISIS seized all those
bank notes. The Iraqi regime will not recall them as many
countries do and issue new currency. And, of course, the reason
for that is that really makes it tough to be a corrupt
politician because you have your store of money in the old bank
notes.
We're losing the cyber war. The number one thing ISIS has
is it does control territory, but the second thing is that our
message in cyber space is terrible. One of the reasons for that
is that we don't have anybody on our team who's paid to
understand Islam. We think that if we can just prove that al-
Baghdadi beheaded innocent girls, that that will undercut his
support. It may increase his support. He may put that up on
YouTube. What we fail to realize is if we can catch him eating
a ham sandwich, that's what will undercut his support.
Ambassador, while you were in government, if you wanted to
call a U.S. Government employee who's full-time job was to be a
true expert in Sharia, in the Quran, in the Hadith, was there
anybody who was a U.S. Government employee you could call on
who had memorized the Quran, which is kind of a basic level of
Islamic scholarship?
Ambassador Benjamin. Yes, sir, I'm sure there are many----
Mr. Sherman. Did you ever call on one? Can you name one,
because I've been told again and again that the State
Department refuses to hire anyone for their knowledge of Islam.
Now, for all I know, our Ambassador to Paraguay is a devote
Muslim, but he's focused on Paraguay. Who would you call? What
office?
Ambassador Benjamin. So, if I wanted an intelligence
briefing, I'd call the intelligence----
Mr. Sherman. Is there anybody in the Intelligence Service?
Ambassador Benjamin. There are many, many, many people.
Mr. Sherman. Who are true graduates of the top Islamic
scholarship schools?
Ambassador Benjamin. No, but there are many other ways of
acquiring that kind of knowledge.
Mr. Sherman. Well, there's many other ways--look, we hire
thousands of lawyers at the State Department. We've got people
on salary because they understand European diplomatic law of
the 1800s. We don't have anybody who's memorized the Quran.
Ambassador Benjamin. That's just not true, sir.
Mr. Sherman. That's not true? Well, I've--can you name
anybody who has?
Ambassador Benjamin. I'm sure that that's the standard.
Mr. Sherman. Okay. How about the standard of being able to
apply both Sunni and Shiite Hadith to the behavior of
individual actors?
Ambassador Benjamin. We have many people who can----
Mr. Sherman. We have many people, but you can't name one.
Ambassador Benjamin. I'm not----
Mr. Sherman. In other testimony from the State Department,
they've said they refuse to hire anybody to do that. But when
you say intel, that means they're not involved in public
diplomacy.
Ambassador Benjamin. We also have people in the
intelligence part of----
Mr. Sherman. Okay. So, you're saying the intel community
advises our public diplomacy and our cyber communications
efforts?
Ambassador Benjamin. Absolutely.
Mr. Sherman. That's an interesting role for intel to be
doing on a day to day basis. I have yet to find a single
communication from the State Department showing the hypocrisy
and the failure to follow Islamic law of our enemies in the
Middle East, nor can you name a single person that has this.
But you're sure they're there.
Ambassador Benjamin. But I can show you 100 different
pieces put out by the Center for Counterterrorism Strategic
Communications that have done exactly that.
Mr. Sherman. Yes, and none of them by somebody who could--
who would be mid-level at any of the top Islamic schools in the
world. Yes, they've listened to the great course's summary of
the Islamic religion.
Ambassador Benjamin. That's an absolutely unacceptable slur
on some truly remarkable scholars----
Mr. Sherman. I asked you what post in the State Department
is hired for their knowledge?
Ambassador Benjamin. I&R.
Mr. Sherman. IR?
Ambassador Benjamin. I&R, Intelligence and Research.
Mr. Sherman. Intelligence and----
Ambassador Benjamin. Also, NEA has expert----
Mr. Sherman. Okay. I've called over there many times and
they've told me nobody, and you're telling me there's somebody,
but you can't name them. And you know that they're only going
to hire people with fancy degrees from Princeton, not
scholarship from the major Islamic universities. But maybe
there's some other reason why our cyber efforts are so
pitifully poor when it comes to confronting ISIS.
Ambassador Benjamin. A major reason why our cyber efforts
are inadequate, sir, is that Congress has never funded them at
an adequate level.
Mr. Sherman. We funded them far more than ISIS is funded,
and it's not like they've accomplished 10 percent of what they
should have. It's not like you come to us with a success story
and say we can do 10 more. We have the largest public diplomacy
effort in the world, and the greatest failure in the world. And
we are losing to people who behead children. We should be able
to do a better job.
Ambassador Benjamin. Well, so this is a much longer
conversation, sir, but the fact is that they have right now a
story that is very attractive to disaffected Muslims in many
countries around the world, and we don't. And that's a real
problem. What would you propose that that message be? Come to
the United States where you can't get a visa? What exactly
should the message be to people who find that to be a really
attractive possibility----
Mr. Sherman. Well, first and foremost would be a review of
Islamic scriptures to demonstrate how what ISIS is doing is
violative of them.
Ambassador Benjamin. Sir, the government----
Mr. Sherman. Giving visa to the----
Ambassador Benjamin [continuing]. Has done this over and
over again and found out that when the U.S. tells Muslims what
is Islamic and what is not, we fail.
Mr. Sherman. We don't have to do the telling. We can be
beseeching those who can issue the fatwas, but we don't have
the background.
Ambassador Benjamin. Do that, too.
Mr. Poe. The gentleman's time has expired.
The Chair recognizes the other gentleman from California,
Mr. Rohrabacher.
Mr. Rohrabacher. Thank you. With all due respect to my
colleague from California, who we agree with most of the time,
I would have to say that certainly the cooperation between our
intelligence services and public diplomacy are not only strong,
but expected to be strong. That's part of their job, and I know
they work with various people. I spent 7 years in the Reagan
White House, and I don't think that they're any different now
than they were then. There was a wide range of cooperation
there with the intelligence community. So, whether or not they
come up with the right policies or decisions, is something else
again.
Anyway, I could go into great detail for you, but I was a
speech writer for President Reagan, and I can tell you that
there was a great deal of resources available on how people
think in that part of the world, and what will appeal to them,
et cetera, at least during the Reagan administration. I don't
know, maybe they don't do that any more.
Mr. Sherman. If the gentleman will yield.
Mr. Rohrabacher. Sure.
Mr. Sherman. I've called over there seeking information
from people who would qualify as Islamic scholars and they've
said, ``We don't hire any of those.''
Mr. Rohrabacher. Maybe that's what they tell a Congressman,
you know. Maybe they've got their----
Mr. Sherman. Well, they're really doing a bad job, or
they're lying to Congress, and I'll leave it to our witness to
tell us which it is.
I yield back.
Mr. Rohrabacher. Okay. Well, thank you very much.
I'm concerned about a couple of things. One of the things
I'm most concerned about is that we end up using our own money,
and our own tax dollars that have been used in the name of
fighting this horrible threat of radical Islamic terrorism. Of
course, we have a President, I might add, who I don't seem to
remember having been able to usher those words, or utter those
words, radical Islamic terrorist, but I'm afraid that the money
that we've been spending, that much of it has gone and ended up
in the hands of the people who are radical Islamic terrorists.
This Third Force that the administration insisted that we
support in Syria rather than going with Assad, which is what
the Russians were proposing, I understand that that Third Force
now is proven that it's actually now working with ISIL, and
that some of their commanders who have been on the payroll up
until 2013 are now engaged in activity with these terrorists.
Is that correct? General, do you know, do you guys know
anything about that?
General Keane. I have no knowledge of that.
Mr. Rohrabacher. Well, the Third Force just--yes, sir, go
ahead.
Mr. Joscelyn. The most recent reports are actually that
someone in the New Syrian Force, a commander who may or may not
have been vetted to be trained, it's not clear to me based on
what CENTCOM is saying. CENTCOM's storyline over the last week
has evolved, but that a commander from this force may or may
not have defected to al-Nusra Front, which is al-Qaeda in
Syria.
Mr. Rohrabacher. Right.
Mr. Joscelyn. Certainly, whether or not he was vetted or
not to provide--be directly involved in the program, he
certainly provided, according to CENTCOM, equipment and
ammunition to al-Nusra Front, which is al-Qaeda, which is U.S.-
supplied equipment and supplies directly to al-Qaeda.
Mr. Rohrabacher. Right. Well, so there's ample evidence
that this has been going on. Maybe we haven't proven the case
yet, but I will just say that it--I think the idea that we
should just create a Third Force on our own and go out there
and support it with people that we don't know, basically,
because we're creating a new force, I think has been a
catastrophe for the stability of the Middle East.
And let me ask about that. Again, why is it that you have
Assad--I mean, during World War II, we sided with Hitler as I
might say Putin acknowledged the other day at a speech. He
said, ``Hey, you worked with us to defeat Hitler. We walked
away from being the Soviet Union, and yet you still won't work
with us even in the Middle East against these radicals.'' Why
is that Assad being a bad guy, but knowing that he doesn't
intend to kill Americans, why aren't we helping, going along
with the idea of going over there and helping the bad guy who
wants to kill people who want to murder Americans? That makes
all the sense in the world to me. Maybe we should have worked
with Putin and it would have been better off. If you want to
refute that, go right ahead.
Ambassador Benjamin. Mr. Rohrabacher, I would make a few
arguments. First, we faced an existential struggle in World War
II that I think made collaborating with Stalin's Russia, an
entirely different proposition from collaborating with a mass
killer like Hafez al-Assad. I don't think that our vital
interests are in any way engaged in the region in the way that
we experienced----
Mr. Rohrabacher. You're saying Assad is worse than Stalin.
Ambassador Benjamin. World War II. No, I'm not saying--I'm
saying it's a different situation and, therefore, we should
employ different standards. But I think the other thing that's
been lost sight of here is that were we to side with Assad, or
were we to put a ground force into Syria to combat ISIL, we
would quickly find ourselves without an awful lot of our allies
in the Sunni Arab world, allies who we have long and historic
relationships with, and who we have many differences with right
now, but who we still do not want to fully alienate. And I
would count among them Saudi Arabia, the UAE, Bahrain, Qatar,
and Kuwait.
Mr. Rohrabacher. Sure, so all of these countries like the
Saudis who actually paid for the pilots to fly planes into our
buildings on 9/11, we're worried about what the Saudis have to
tell us. And I will tell you one thing. At least you know these
ISIL people are right up front that they want to murder us. We
put up with Pakistan, we put up with Saudi Arabia, and I think
we are providing or giving ourselves some sort of delusion
about what the real world is all about. And I don't know what
we've done to punish Saudis about what they did to help on 9/
11, but radical Islam is our enemy, and the Saudis have
financed it, and some of the very same people you're talking
about have been financing ISIL. Have they not? Some of the same
governments you just mentioned have financed ISIL. Isn't that
correct?
Ambassador Benjamin. No, I don't believe there's any
evidence that any of those governments have financed ISIL. I
think that there have been cases in which some of them have
financed other groups that we would consider too extremist for
our support----
Mr. Rohrabacher. Who then became ISIL.
Ambassador Benjamin. What?
Mr. Rohrabacher. Who then became ISIL. Anyway, it's a very
complicated--this is a complicated world. It's not something
that can be just done with slogans. I understand that, and we
need all the guidance we can get, and all the information. The
General and I had a good talk out in the ante room beforehand
about his various ways of analyzing a situation, which I found
to be very helpful, and thank you. I had to go into the
backroom with--we had a meeting with the Japanese, a Japanese
delegation I had to meet with. I will read your testimony and
look at it. Thank you for your advice today. And thank you, Mr.
Chairman.
Mr. Poe. I thank the gentleman.
The Chair will recognize a member not of this committee,
but certainly welcome to ask questions, Ms. Sheila Jackson Lee
from Texas, for 5 minutes.
Ms. Jackson Lee. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, very much, and to
the ranking member. And let me thank you very much for
convening a very important hearing. As a member of the Homeland
Security Committee and Judiciary, and a former member of this
committee, I've dealt with these issues quite frequently. So,
I'm just going to raise questions based upon my following of
this, and I raise these questions with Mr. Benjamin. And I know
it's difficult to maybe give a precise answer, but let me try
to probe that.
Let me just take something from speculation and news
articles that the driving of the Syrian refugees, tragic. No
one will forget the 3-year-old, the picture of that will remain
stained in our hearts and our minds. Do you think there was a
strategy to drive those refugees at the time that they were
into Europe, which was not prepared even though the generosity
of Germany was noted, to destabilize their resettlement
program? I'm just going to start there, work my way back to
Syria. Do you have any sense of how those refugees, the large
numbers that they were, were coming into Europe at that time?
Ambassador Benjamin. No, I'm afraid I don't. I can't say
exactly what the trigger was. There were a number of things
that happened on the ground in Syria that I think convinced
Syrians that the situation was only going to get more dire. I
don't think that there was anything that was done intentionally
to disrupt European affairs; although, I do think that some of
the central and eastern European countries that were
waystations for the refugees saw it in their interest to hustle
them out of the country toward Austria and Germany as fast as
they could.
Ms. Jackson Lee. My concern, and I'll go now back to Syria.
One, 2 years ago, many of us were supporting the Syrian
American community, and still do in terms of if we were back
one or 2 years ago about supporting that military that was the
Syrian, I believe, military component that was against Assad,
to provide them with the support systems that they needed. And,
obviously, it didn't come full circle for that to occur. We now
find ourselves with the vacant space or the vacuum in which
ISIS/ISIL has been able to take up residence, take up violence,
establish a Caliphate, and to destroy any source of life that
we possibly could have.
Do you have a position on what I think the President has
offered, is that Assad must go, but there is room for his
leaving to be tempered, or to be, if you will, established
through a process. Do you see any good intentions in Russia's
effort to maintain that Assad must stay? And, of course, now
not only is there a Caliphate, but Russia now has seemingly an
open door in Syria. It certainly has assets that it wants to
protect, resources it wants to protect. And how do you see that
playing out? Is Russia going to be an effective partner? Is
Russia's dominance of Syria going to be a detriment to trying
to get it stabilized for the good people of Syria that I met
when I was in Damascus and spent time there who want to come
back and reclaim their country?
Ambassador Benjamin. Well, you've asked a number of very
good questions, and some of them are hard to answer. I think
the short story here is that we do not know the full scope of
President Putin's designs in Syria. He has talked about putting
together a coalition to fight ISIL. And I think that there are
intense conversations going on as there were yesterday at the
U.N. between the President and Putin on exactly this issue.
I think that it is important to underscore that Russia has
long looked at Syria as one of its very small numbers of true,
reliable allies. And that has been true for many decades at
this point, so it's not entirely surprising that Russia decided
to take this step to support this one very reliable ally.
And I think that the President or the administration, I
should say, is making a number of noises suggesting that there
may be more room for discussing the long game in terms of
Assad, but I think it's quite clear that Russia is not going to
throw him overboard any time soon. And we don't have a lot of
leverage there to effect that. So, that is why I said in my
statement earlier, that I think that, ultimately, because of
the crimes he's committed, Assad will need to go. But I think
that there's a lot more flexibility in thinking about how that
might happen now in Washington and around the world.
Ms. Jackson Lee. The General looks like he wants to answer.
General Keane. May I respond to that?
Ms. Jackson Lee. General.
General Keane. That's a very interesting question.
Ms. Jackson Lee. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
General Keane. First of all, the reason why the Russians
came is because Assad for this last year has been losing
territory, particularly northern territory, and particularly in
Idlib Province, mainly due to Jabhat al-Nusra. And, also, he's
begun to erode his political base in terms of the Alawites
possibly thinking about somebody else. So, a 60-year
relationship with Russia, former Soviet Union, over 100,000
Russians before the civil war began actually lived in that
belt, that Alawite belt; a base on the Mediterranean, the only
base that he has outside of Russia itself, he cannot in his own
self-interest lose the strategic interest he has in Syria. It
is his foothold in the Middle East, so here he comes, and he's
going to prop up this regime. That is the main reason he's
there, he's creating a bit of another narrative. It's about
ISIS, it's about propping up the regime.
And here's where I agree totally with President Obama in
his U.N. speech, because what that does then, what Putin is
saying is I am reinforcing the status quo inside Syria, and
that means the humanitarian catastrophe that we have been
watching for 4 years will continue because Putin is going to
subsidize that regime and make certain it doesn't fall. And,
remember, Assad has been making war on his people for these 4
years. It's not just barrel bombing, it's systematic genocide,
starvation in towns and neighborhoods, destroying every food
factory that they can destroy, bread factories, canned food
factories, et cetera, 62 percent of all hospitals he's
destroyed because that's another way of killing people, if they
can't be treated, 70 percent of all ambulances, and now the use
of chlorine gas. It's a very methodical systematic way he's
using to kill his population.
This is what Putin is underwriting, and this is the status
quo that that President spoke about when he said, ``The carnage
will continue.'' That, I believe, will happen, sad as that is.
Ms. Jackson Lee. Thank you both.
Mr. Poe. The Chair thanks the witnesses and the
gentlewoman; the Chair thanks the members, as well.
At this point, this subcommittee hearing is adjourned.
[Whereupon, at 3:27 p.m., the subcommittee was adjourned.]
A P P E N D I X
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