There are still a few seats up front. Up. On good morning, everyone. And welcome. Thank you for joining us this morning for what i am sure will be a very, very interesting discussion on a very timely topic. My name is Richard Scherrer and i am the chairman of the board of the policy council and we are holding our 99th capitol hill conference. Isyou know, the topic today u. S. Iranian confrontation, domestic, regional, and global implications. We have a full house and there if a few seats in the back, you want to try to find one over there. We do have a full house, so i apologize for those who are not able to find a seat. Inore we begin, as you saw the announcement, im a former wouldador to oman, and i like to note the end of an era in the region, and that was the passing of his majesty on january the 10th. For almost 50 years, he was a source of great wisdom and a very good counsel to many, including Many American president s, who sought his advice to deal with the challenges in the region. I was privileged as ambassador to have the opportunity to do the same, and there is no one i respect more in terms of his intelligence and his knowledge and his efforts to try to bring peace and stability to the region then his majesty. He will certainly be missed. Before i turn to todays program, let me say a few words about the middle east policy council. The council was established in 1981 and our purpose is to promote dialogue and education concerning the u. S. And the countries of the middle east. We have three flagship programs. Our quarterly capitol hill conferences, such as todays event, our quarterly journal, middle east policy, you saw copies on the table outside, which has a very good reputation among those with an interest in middle Eastern Affairs and can be found in some 16,000 libraries worldwide. And our Educational Outreach program called teach mideast, which provides Educational Resources on the middle east, targeted mailing toward secondary schools and teachers. I would encourage you to visit. S on our website to learn more about our organization and our activities. Turning to todays event, we note that this program is being livestreamed on our website. I am pleased to welcome all of those who have joined us online. It is also being broadcast on cspan. The conference proceedings will be posted in video and transcript form on our website, as well, a recap of the discussion. Transcript ofed the program will be published in the next issue of our journal middle east policies. Let me briefly introduce our panelists. Suzannebegin with dr. Maloney, the Deputy Director for Foreign Policy and a senior fellow at the center for middle east policy, energy, security and climate initiatives at the brookings institution. Next, we will have ambassador doug filament, who was the president of the Arab Institute in washington and a former ambassador to iraq and kuwait. Joyce, theome washington correspondent to the uae National Newspaper and an adjunct professor at George Washington university. And finally, we will have ambassador john limburg, former Deputy Assistant for air on and a former ambassador to the Islamic Republic of mauritania. I would like to thank all four of you for joining us today. The program will begin with each catalyst delivery brief with each catalyst delivery brief opening remarks, followed by a discussion session that will be moderated by mike coley, the executive Director Director of the middle east policy council. Have placedthat we index cards on all of the seats, and for those of you in the back, our staff can provide you with index cards. These index cards to write down questions, which you have, as the speakers are speaking. Then hold up the card. Our staff will then collect the cards during the presentations and give them to our colleague so he can consolidate the questions for the discussion sessions. Thank you for your cooperation on that. Please also remember to silence your cell phones. Thank you. With that, let me turn over the podium to dr. Maloney. Good morning. Sorry for the technical difficulties. I was expecting to sit and talk, but i am happy to stand and talk , especially so many of you are standing. Thank you all for coming and thank you to the middle east policy council for including me in this event. Im surrounded by ambassadors as l as im humbled to kick things off. This isnt the first time i have been back to speak before the middle east policy council in about 20 years. That last event i spoke at was at a capitol hill forum. Colleaguesellow asked me to copy to discuss what we might say and our younger son turned 11 today. Washington can be a place of great romance, great opportunity, and i hope in 20 years, there are many other benefits to this discussion beyond that sort of thing. Let me make a couple of quick points, speaking from someone who focuses on iran, even when much in the headlines as it has been in the past month or so. Withorld dodged a bullet the attack that killed Qassem Soleimani, the iconic iranian of their forces. It gave size what they needed in terms of an opportunity you gain both sides what they needed in terms of an opportunity. Side, dodgingn Many American missiles. It gave them the optics they needed for their own population, partita at the close of what particularly, at the close of what was the end of soleimanis life, and to bring the country together at a time when the legitimacy and popularity and strength of the regime appears to be very much fraying. At the same time, it gave the Trump Administration an opportunity to walk away, simply because there were not any fatalities as a result of that missile strike, at least on the american side. We now know there were 12 people who were seriously injured and , including af iraq traumatic brain injury. That is a detail that is just coming out at this stage and may give us a little more awareness of how close we came to what might have been the first fullfledged conventional exchange of military conflict between the United States and iran in at least 30 years, dating back to the tanker wars and the skirmishes that went on in the gulf. Became close and we we came close and we are not in a safe zone yet. That is the main point i wanted to make. Neither side in my estimation, once war. Rositas has had a front for american conventional has had a front row seat for american conventional war. It is not simply a defeat for air on. Give what end the regime it would end the regime itself and they dont want to end up in a spider hole. They also have plenty of incentives to escalate. From the Trump Administration perspective, this is a president who actually reads the national andd has done that aregnizes the situation we in and has an overwhelming incentive to avoid a fullfledged military intervention in the middle east. He has been campaigning for years about the cost attributed to the war in iraq and how that could have been spent better at home. There was very little wag the dog scenarios for trump that would be an upside for his political prospect in this Election Year if he were to find himself in a conventional war with the Islamic Republic of iran. Set of, we are in a circumstances, largely because of the Trump Administrations decision to walk away from the nuclear deal of may of 2018, to reimpose economic sanctions, and to try to drive those sanctions into overdrive in may of 2019 with the decision to resend the previous waivers that were enabling the iranians to at least legally export about a Million Barrels a day of their oil, nearly 50 of their presanctioned levels on the decision to drive those oil exports and oil down to zero though what the obama ministries and was able to impose, with the support of the International Community between 2012 and 2013, 1 of the elements of obamas policy that helped lead to the First Successful sustained negotiations between the Islamic Republic and iran and the United States since negotiations and at thehostage crisis in 1981 Trump Administration pot decision obviously led to a shift in iranian policy, and everything that we are dealing with today is a function of an ever desired is a function of that policy. With a smallgan attack of merchant ship and infrastructure in and around the goal of an was calibrated and precise, and was intended to send a signal to the International Community, number of messages intended there that i think are consistent with what the way with the way air on is responding to the situation with the way iran is responding to the situation. They have a doctrine. If you sit back and accept pressure that it will be read as weakness and you have to punch back and punch back hard. We saw that over the course of may and june and july, when there were a number of attacks, including military firings on private facilities and personnel in air rock. We saw that in iraq. That from iranian the oily hitting processing facility, which took out about 5 of saudi oil production. A significant and precise strike, but one, like all the previous ones that avoid civilian casualties, that avoided significant environmental damage in the region, that also avoided precipitating the kind of we nearly found ourselves in last week, and i think we will likely see emerge once again. This is the iranian playbook. There is really no reason for them to change that playbook now. They have more reason to push back and to punch back and to demonstrate to the Trump Administration and the world, that they are not going to simply live with the siege of their economy would have cost 200 billion, depending on which statistic you believe, not in terms not just in terms of the oil revenue they have had to forgo, or in terms of the revenues locked up in foreign bank accounts, but in terms of the opportunity cost, the growth iran would have experienced. Instead, the iranian economy is retracting in upwards of 10 alone. It is not sustainable and definitely. The iranians need to push back because they need to galvanize International Support for their position. They need to press this crisis so that it is not simply suffered by the iranian people and leadership. They need to find a way to make this a problem for the entire International Community. They also now have the extra incentive of needing to event soleimanis death. Perhaps meaning to restore some of their own domestic legitimacy that has been further shattered by the revelation that it was the Iranian Military that shot down a civilian airliner and killed 176 mostly iranian or iranianheritage individuals in the midst of the Ballistic Missile strike. Still need to break the siege. They will still be pushing back. They will be doing it again precisely calibrated. Wem satellite imagery see from satellite imagery, the iranians stated publicly that they are peering to try to avoid military casualties. They were appearing to try to control the cycle of escalation, but they are not going to back down. Let me just close with two final points and turn the mic over to my colleagues. The first is it will be very tempting for all of us to blame this on the Trump Administration , the dysfunctional policy process, the catastrophic decision to walk away from a nuclear agreement, which was not perfect, but was functioning to try to restrain their Nuclear Ambitions and finding ways to further ensure iran would not be able to develop or have access to Nuclear Weapons capabilities. Let try to resist that temptation, even though it is an Election Year. You need a discussion of where we go from here, whether you were a supporter of maximum pressure, or an opponent of maximum pressure. Today, we are in a place for the United States and iran have been close to conventional war and are leather to be back there once again soon. Here and place where the nuclear deal is not functioning as intended and we simply cannot no matterstatus quo, what the democratic candidate say. That deal is now essentially all but lost to us and we have to start thinking about how we create an opportunity for some kind of new negotiation that will have to involve both the United States and iran. It will have to address the Nuclear Issue and it will have to find a way to build confidence that it is not simply a nuclear deal because iran is not simply a Nuclear Issue. There is a range of other interests involved, most dramatically of course, over the past few weeks, regional interests. One final point i want to make, although it is a little bit outside of the issue of the u. S. Iranian conflict, and that is what we saw on the streets to the soleimani death and to the downing and revelations about Ukrainian Air 752. Volatilerscores how iranian Public Opinion is and how precarious the regime is at this time. I dont say that because im a believer in an american policy of regime change, but it is important to recognize there are a lot of lot of passion shared widely in saw that in a response to the soleimani death. Many people went to the streets because they are encouraged, and even some cases, coerced to do so, but many went to the streets to mourn soleimanis death because they saw him as someone protecting the wider world from all of the threats they have faced, really says the iraqi invasion in september 1980, so he was popular, even with people who detested the Islamic Republic. But what you saw in the aftermath of the Ukrainian Air disaster was this recognition on the part iranians that had been echoing across society in many different terrain is over the course of the past several years. There was a political editorial that described it as a crisis of competence. The sense of whether it was the earthquake, floods, dust storms or a variety of economic and social issues that iran has been facing. The government is not capable of doing what it needs to do and is not trying to protect the best interest of the iranian people and not advancing a better way of life for iranians. And this is an incredibly powerful sentiment, and it is one facing leadership, which is being confronted by succession, election, and aging. As a result, i think we have to be prepared for a lot of uncertainty within iran and a lot of unpredictability in the way it responds to the challenges it is facing. Thanks. Remind you if you have written a question, can you hold your hand up and we will collect it. Good morning, everybody. I want to thank rich and tom and the middle east policy council with having this seminar and inviting a good panel. Im hoping for a good discussion. There are three things i would like to do. Mostly to spark further discussion later on, i want to first expand a little bit on the timeline of the events of the last few years. I want to talk about my interpretation of where Trump Administration policy on iran is a maybe going, and i would like of thisabout the impact probable return to status quo and with the impact could be on iraq over the last five to 10 years. First of all, if you are talking about the timeline between persia and mesopotamia, you have to set your timeline. I am not going back thousands of years or even going back to much of the 20th century. 1979, and in53, the interest of time, i will pick 2003 as my starting point where you have Islamic Republic iranest entrenched in and the decapitation of husseins government let loose in iraq, a lot of the old rivalries from mesopotamia suny versus rural, tribal versus urban, many, many fissures within society in mesopotamia. Iran tried to take advantage of that and work very hard to insinuate people who supported iran, people who support the leadership of the country by the religious leadership into the andership inside iraq, soleimani as he took over the forces, worked hard to create in iraq, security structures, which mirrored what had been created under this vomit republic. You saw the creation of you saw the creation of malicious, finding American Forces through the department of American Forces through 2011. You saw thetime, attempts by people in iraq who were either nationalists shiite nationalists or proiranian in their outlook to put into government positions, especially in the second tenure of an official, people who were sympathetic to iran. Democracy inew the iraq, the impact on decisionmaking today. American forces left the country in 2011. Again, there was a bit of a power struggle among iraqis, where soleimani and shiite militias gained in strength and with the rise of isis and its itasion of iraq in 2014, brought the United States and the coalition back into the country, but also gave soleimani and their forces and the forces a chance to legitimize malicious that they created earlier and expand on that. This changed significantly with the Trump Administration and 2017. Whens clear by this time the administration withdrew from the Iran Nuclear Agreement and impose the maximum campaign on iran that the relationship is going to fundamentally change. And the reaction of iran initially was relatively predictable, from the american withdrawal from the agreement and the position of economic sanctions, iran tried to work with european countries, with china and other trading partners to find workarounds to prevent the American Economic sanctions from having a profound effect on the iranian economy. They try that for the better part of a year and almost got into a deal with the european union, but that fell apart because of the secondary sanctions imposed by the u. S. Administration, and after a year, iranians decided they were not going to succeed in reducing economic pressure through this kind of diplomatic and economic means. They then began to announce their withdrawal from particular commitments under the new agreement without actually coming out of the agreement itself to try to put pressure on the other signatories to pressure the United States to keep the deal in tact and help open up the iranian economy. This did not work well either. Iran tookdle of 2019, a different strategy to increase the cost to the friends and allies of the United States in the region of the economic sanctions. There is no way iran could have imposed on the United States economic sanctions that would have the same impact that the United States sanctions then on iran. So what they did was a series of shippingacks on oil and americas friends in the region in the hopes those friends will put pressure on the United States. So, you saw attacks on shipping outside the straight if your bermuda. The strait of hermuse, and in september of last year, the strikes on all processing the silly days and oil fields strikes on Oil Processing facilities and oil fields. It did not hurt Financial Markets and he did not result in significant pressure on washington to relax the sanctions. ,bout a month after the attack at the end of october, iran escalated once more, and you see a series of rocket attacks inside iraq near the american embassy, but on a series of Iraqi Military bases that house american and other personnel. Through the end of october through early december, there was not much impact. On the eighth of december, attacks on a counterterrorism Training Facility injured six soldiers, but no american or Coalition Forces. But i think throughout this period, the trunk administration, the Trump Administration, said the redline of the United States is an american casualty at the hands of iran, their allies, and we will hold iran responsible if there is an american casualty. Expected toiranians get some sort of reaction from washington and some other things they had carried out during the fall of 2019. And for the attack that took place on the 27th of december on an iraqi base, it was a different attack. It was a barrage of 31 rockets fired at a base that had both iraqi and American Military personnel. It killed one military American Contractor who was a naturalized aaqiamerican, and killed couple of iraqi policemen and injured a couple of iraqi soldiers. But they wanted to cross the Trump Administration. Redline and they set off a quick succession of escalation that we remember from three weeks ago. Thest immediately after Trump Administration ordered attacks on iraq and syria, linewed by an attempt we will break away from this coverage to renew gaveltogavel coverage. We will return to this middle east policy Council Event after the house is done. Live coverage of the houses here on cspan. The clerk washington, d. C. , january 17, 2020, i hereby appoint the honorable donald s. Beyer jr. To act as speaker pro tempore on this day, signed, nancy pelosi, speaker of the house of representatives. The speaker pro tempore the prayer will be offered by our guest chaplain. The chaplain let us pray. Good and gracious father, you are the source of every good thing and fount of every blessing. We praise you for the great care you have for us, our children. As a source of all that is good and true we ask you to inspire within our hearts a greater longing to pursue these ends and draw us ever closer to yourself. We ask you to send forth your blessing on all those gathered here in this house. May we receive your guidance and wisdom in accomplishing the task set before us. Protect us. Keep our country safe from all harm. And may we pursue in freedom of heart the things that are yours, now and forever, amen. The speaker pro tempore pursuant to section 3a of House Resolution 790, the journal of the last days proceed sgs approved. The chair will lead the house in the pledge of allegiance. I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of america and to the republic for which it stands, one nation, under god, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all. The speaker pro tempore the chair lays before the house a communication. The clerk the honorable the speaker, house of representatives, madam, pursuant to the permission granted in clause 2h of rule 2 of the rules of the u. S. House of representatives, the clerk received the following message from the secretary of the sthath on january 16, 2020, at 1 13 p. M. , at Senate Passed senate 3084, that the Senate Passed senate 3201, that the Senate Passed with an amendment h. R. 886. That the Senate Passed without amendment h. R. 5430. With best wishes, i am, signed sincerely, cheryl l. Johnson. The speaker pro tempore pursuant to section 3bmbing of House Resolution 790, the house stands adjourned until 10 00 a. M. On the unitedssure on states and Coalition Forces because one of the main goals of Qassem Soleimani and the forces over the past decade was to push a western military forces and as much western influence as possible out of iraq, so iran could use iraq as