The hall. Judges would be happy to sign your copy. Thank you. [inaudible conversations] you are watching 48 hours of nonfiction authors and books on cspan2s booktv. Christopher harmon is next on booktv. The offer looks at the continued threat of terrorism today and talks about the Obama Administrations efforts to combat terrorism since the killing of Osama Bin Laden. This is about an hour. [applause] thank you for coming on such a chilly day and i am delighted to present perhaps 25 or 30 minutes of comments and will forward to interaction with you on the questions you have. All so very glad to see jim phillips, worked on terrorism issues, must be a quarter century and there are very few people in the world who write with the intelligence and prudence that jim phillips does. A couple reasons i wanted to write the book, i will start this way with the way terrorism encounters the citizen. I remember in 1980, reading clippings in newspapers, it was in law chicago ariane and a woman was looking out her window near her home and saw a van pull up, this proved out between 9 different people and looked rather like an athletic team, jogging uniforms in the bags but as you looked out the window, this lady, Walter Jacobson decided she should be nervous about this. There have been some robberies in the area by Puerto Ricans separatists and she noticed a few things that were odd to her. These athletic bag sure seemed much heavier than she was used to seeing with athletes and secondly some of the guys were smoking so she decided this wasnt going to work out at all and she thought for a minute and called the police and in effect interrupted and armed robberies that was plotted by nine members of the faa l n with two others nearby and there was a cache of weapons and a sawedoff shotgun and all these people went to jail although oddly enough president clinton pardon the bunch of them. One of the policeman who was there at the time said, just trying to beat she read that they all felt lucky that day and a newspaper reporter shows this happened during a routine traffic stop in those accounts were incorrect. Walter jacobson, i have been unable to find her first name. She broke an attempted robbery for the greatest importance by hardened terrorists. That started in new york, a nationwide push by the nation of Homeland Security that if you see something, say something, captures well vincennes that we as citizens, have a duty and opportunity for cases that touch upon civics security. Our slogan more than i do, some which have more emphasis, you will often see signs around military bases that say if you see anything that looks at all suspicious immediately report, i would think it is better for the public to think a little bit to contemplate a little bit and ask what they are seeing and not to jump to conclusions too quickly. I like the notion of responsiveness among citizens. I do think by and large citizens have some understanding that they are involved in some ways. I wrote in part to tell the stories of some citizens who have been involved in good ways. In the spirit of mrs. Jacobson for example there was another person who was part of the Lackawanna Community in new york and no one has reported to this person is although there is a good book on the case. The person suspected in watching the many men who come back in mid 2001, a portentous time from overseas, she felt they were up to some bad things. She wrote in somewhat troubled english to authorities and said they ought to look into this halfdozen young men who had come back because this person who wrote seemed to feel those men were a threat to the community and he or she was absolutely right and authorities did look into it and those people had not only been a broad to southwest asia but most of them had been in a camp run by afghanis and Osama Bin Laden and they were there for training. I found another category besides these person who act privately and quietly and others we have among us, those who have tremendous physical courage, not looking for trouble but seemed to show the right attitude and response when the alarm bell sounds. If we think back to 9 11 it is astonishing the way those men charge down the United Airlines flightpennsylvania, in new blight over that is pretty unusual this my favorite man on the spot is a woman, this does go back always but you may remember her little bit. She was central european, an american citizen, 40 years old. It was her fate to be the lead stewardess on twa 47 on that flight so thugs had attacked the plane, taken people hostage. They were working a perverse psychological approach to breakdown the passengers. She was framed naturally, who wouldnt be. Her composure returned and figure out how to moderate this impossible situation. She spoke german and some of the hijackers did as well. And all the parties had. She intervened, sometimes psychologically, sometimes physically. They once asked her to sing german songs to them believe it or not in along a drama, so many the pilot both showed amazing courage in the twa 847 hijacking, remarkable. I suppose we all admire this kind of thing, wonder if we would be up to it ourselves. These people proved themselves up to the level of events and extraordinary persons. The third category i found to look at it, the tried and true professional, the person trained to the kind of intervention that sometimes happens and it is not very often but they are involved. We saw someone shot at los angeles airport, not everybody in the business of security, public or private might be top of the wind. Some might seem as Airline Passengers of little disengaged, some might be very good but only five years will they really know their grade, but otherwise we would meet in public life, many people involved in the security business to prove themselves very capable. They rise to the moment. Maybe it takes you back too far but in 1988 remarkable location in new jersey is one of the things that a trooper named robert took notice of a driver as they are trained to do and pulled him over for moving violation, which he distrusted and quickly simple traffic stop turned into an arrest. The man he caught that day was a member of the Japanese Red Army which train with libyans and international terrorists, and a two Year Anniversary of the bombing in libya in 1986. It was only his interventions that saved that recruiting station from being bombed. 1995 you may remember Timothy Mcveigh came very close to escape over a state line after bombing the Oklahoma City building. He was caught by an oklahoma patrolman named charles hanger noticed the simplest of things, he didnt have proper plates on his vehicle and notice when they were passing on the highway at a very high speed so he swung around and stopped mcveigh. He was a trained patrolman so rather quickly css that a slight bulge within the jacket of mcveigh suggested a pistol and so they had a botox about that and the terrorist said my side arm is loaded and patrolman said so is mine. After a brief standoff the terrorist got into his car and dutifully wrote back to the station and it didnt stop there. The man was inside, a painter returned to his vehicle, long training had taught in many signs the suspect tried to divest themselves of material which you can learn a lot from. Sure enough he found a business card, paulsons military supply company. At 5 a stick they need more. No one knew what mcveigh had just done in Oklahoma City. They were only in the running about it and never thought to convict connect him to it. One other case, 99, the famous millennium period when the country had trimmers about what would come with the year 2000, diana dean, a customs inspector in Washington State coming over the border, he got nervous after too many questions bolted from the car and diana dean probably save Los Angeles International airport from a bomb abdul raa a raassam was intending to deliver. Theres a story about john oneill. We all look back to wondering about those who before 9 11 actually connect and all the dots. John oneill was one man who did so. Remarkable, welltrained, for years, he had believed al qaeda was coming back to his city. He knew about 1993, he would do anything he could to move the fbi along, and other agencies in the white house and overseas, john oneill was the kind of cassandra. He knew it was coming and would keep warning them. Eventually got discouraged and retired from the fbi and took a job as head of security in the World Trade Center in new york city and so he turned up for work in august of 2001. He took the job only for a few days. He was on scene when it all happened and died in the rubble. That kind of citizen is one reason wanted to write the book. Another is a different reason. I wanted to write this short book to talk about the way we have a grand strategy in our fight against terrorism. I dont think a lot of americans know that or see all the pieces and help the citizens develop a fuller perspective on what the business has done by all parts in this drama. In that respect it couple of assumptions, the book starts with the idea that terrorism is a very real thing, a definable thing and a bad thing and in the academy those are all accepted propositions. I use the definition from a think tank but it always guided my scholarship and terrorism is the deliberate systematic murder, maiming and menacing of the innocent to inspire fear for political ends. The character of the terrorist threat we face is explored in a boat starts with al qaeda but there is also a broad enough to bring in many of the other hostile political and religious groups that we see. It is the premise of the book that we are at war with al qaeda. We can find quotations from the white house saying they agree with that but i would argue that in the last year there has been some doubt on the question of whether we are at war with al qaeda. I argue that we are and we ought to be and i think it is of bad things that it has a become an open question of how long this fight will occur for reasons i will get into. The central part of the book tries to look at our strategy. What are the components of it . How does it work . The white house and National Security council have the central coordinating role, of making all the agencies Work Together if they can and all the bureaucracies respond if they can and is not easy, and the account of how hard it is to do this no matter what party is in office or who is in charge so you might have for example Commerce Department in the business of promoting exports very reasonably. We would want them to do that yet there could be tension with the Treasury Department which might be eager to put sanctions on a particular business, a particular powerful individual may be a state sponsor of terrorism like iran at a time when it is not convenient with respect to diplomatic initiatives. Our intelligence agencies certainly different legitimately, they can quarrel about assessments and priorities. There is a fine new book called treasurys war by ones arrive they juan zarate the talks about an intelligence in one place but they have a meeting with justice because justice is eager to make arrests. One of them has to stand down. There are famous for citizens we dont see how many overseas personnel we have that are not military or cia, the Drug Enforcement agency has of remarkable International Network which is active, smart people, they go through many of the same schools in the state that other experts in security do. The fbi you would know has some obligations overseas and deploys on a spot basis, add hoc basis to a lot of crime scenes and they are extremely important so there are some stationed overseas, many go overseas innocent contingency. There is a remarkable intelligence organization, that probably was contested initially by folks like fbi and cia but they felt if the government was not going to defend her very well after 9 11 they needed to set up their own defense so it will put out tentacles and listening devices, trying to keep the pulse on parts of the world which they think are dangerous and they do this through the appropriate channels. Before the world comes again to new york in a way they dont like. So the nsc if they are doing well, moderating these turf problems. The book has been several page groups in each of the major elements of our strategy so diplomacy, Public Diplomacy, economic tools, why enforcement, the military, diplomacy is a good place to start. Weiner terrorism is very politically and usually international, diplomacy therefore has some prospects. Diplomacy has done well in some cases, so most folks regard the irish settlement, 1997 onward until 2007, that was an impressive product from multilateral diplomacy involving a lot of the irish and british players but a lot of outsiders as well as some americans, mr. Clinton, george mitchell, a lot of others from around the world. Bilateral has some successes, bilateral diplomacy by respect to the libya problem, we work with United Kingdom on that. I also in the book draws some cautionary notes because in going to conferences, watching the way, quote, talking to terrorists has become one of the hottest fields in my own district i have a lot of reservations about the way in which diplomacy can succeed, just how far it can go so i am more reserved in that respect but i look at the falls negotiators stories of which there are some. One is the famous law case where is he said the gunman to do the dirty work and positioned himself, president government as a kind of intermediary who could step in and be helpful. There was a classic case of colonel gaddafi, one of the last cases of deliberate export of international terrorism, 99 2000, there was a crisis, gaining multiple hostages. Out of the philippines, gaddafi then steps in in a grandiose way as a mediator and offers a fantastic amount of money, 20 million is what is referenced by a filipino diplomat who did a book on this and this is still waters, solve the crisis and Everything Else and it was marvelous because he had helped aby sayyef before, he also emerges as the classic diplomat which was good for the image you is seeking. It was highly skillful stuff. There is a lot to be wary about in diplomacy and not always an easy pay off. A lot of groups went for decades with many attempts it intervention which were all failed and simply had to be crushed. Economics is an important tool. You know, we know, every College Graduate knows if you are going to do economic sanctions, it is important to have as many people in the mix to hold them with some patients for some time, sanctions take a long time to work but sometimes they do work. I bet you if you think about it most of you will think sanctions had some role in the resolution of south africa with its apartheid regime. Certainly my studies made me believe libyan behavior was changed by sanctions. Was changed some in the 1990s and was dramatically changed in 20034, some of the people are right here in town who did this. Intelligence man, ambassador robert joseph, as they work with the United Kingdom to press the libyan authorities to get them to divest themselves of wm ds, not only the supplies but the actable machinery. This is prelude to what you are seeing with syria. The machine was put on a ship and brought to the United States. Was a wonderful resolution of a longstanding problem with the gadhafi regime. That is facilitated by intelligence and diplomats from two Different Countries and it is an extremely good story. I goes then into the questions of the strategy so i need to mention a few of these. Mr. Bush then writes the First National Counter Terrorist tragedy we have and he did two of them and his principles were defeated terrorists and their organizations, designed them sponsorship and sanctuary, diminish the underlying conditions terrorists exploit and defend the u. S. At home. The government to the superb job at that. He got himself a very broad congressional authorization which i am sorry to say is being prematurely questioned. He argues in his strategy that terrorists are truly evil. He is not afraid to say so. He said they are enemies of humanity which is an old term in International Law that compares them to pirates are people who do genocide. He had a strategy of attacking the core of al qaeda but also his adviser called this articulation whereby the links between the groups are broken up if need be and i suppose assessing that would require clearances that i certainly dont have the. The Obama Administration enters the fight and surprises many of us, probably you too with remarkable continuity in some of the actual practices because rhetorically he had suggested was going to be pretty different but in fact more similarities than differencess appeared. His strategy published in 2011 has less marshaling. Certainly less conviction that this is a war. He does call for help from allies which is prudent, he says he will get at the roots of terrorism, something that is exceedingly hard to do. I wonder how jim phillips would assess getting at the roots of terrorism in the middle east. I wonder how anybody with whatever level of expertise could imagine really solving those problems rather than just managing or dealing with them, tries to get at their roots, mr. Bush thought we could do this best if we could advance democracy because democracy is a great prophylactic against terrorism and that is a proposition which is by and large true but also has some difficulties because we have seen many open societies which have wonderfully open political orders but which are ravaged by terrorism so it is not the full answer but it may be part of a good answer. Theres a bit of a paradox there so i am not sure mr. Bush or mr. Obama can tell us exactly how to deal with the roots of terrorism but i suppose we all want to try. Mr. Obama said the need to do a lot more with allies and all little bit less on the go alone approach, a marked rhetorical difference. I had no problem with that. International efforts are exceedingly important, at the very heart of trying to counter terrorism. In moral terms he says less about the evil in terrorism and more warnings to was about evil in our own practices. In counterterrorism have we crossed a line in ways that are troubling and he is especially worried about the conduct of torture. I have no problem with that. We shall oppose torture. The normal Legal Framework for ct operations, great idea but i dont know if we have seen this yet. The adorable Legal Framework our citizens understand or even counterterrorism experts understand. That seems clear. All the fuss about closing guantanamo, i would say is related to this failure to have an appropriately goals strategy. I can offer some comments but the short of its is when james cole and eric holder and others were talking about this in old Campaign Days it seemed easy to criticize guantanamo but once in office for a variety of reasons they found they found guantanamo quite useful for managing the legal odd problem of the detainees that we have for neither pure criminals more people in uniform who we would treat purely through military means. The basic point, the administration is a bit soft on whether we are at war. We are repeatedly seeing that. Starting with the may 23rd speech at National Defense university, suggestion that the war should end, the war will end, no one wants perpetual war. There are ambiguities that entered into the conversation which right now are simply unhelpful because al qaeda still thinks it is that war and i think we are still at war. There are parts of the executive branch, the military to think they are at war and i think going back to the question of legal strategy some of the conundrums we made for ourselves about the tension, about surveillance are resolved if you consider that we are in fact still in a stake of war with al qaeda. Some of those problems get quite clear. We had a great deal of rights as a belligerent against this sub state organization which we can exercise in that respect. Last thing i want to say is there is of course a leader of the opposition. It is estranged thing our president almost never mentions ayman alzarqawi but i think he should. The document published by the white house in june of 2011 explicitly says in two places that Osama Bin Laden is the only leader that al qaeda ever had and since he had just been killed, that is an extremely important and interesting statement but it is only half true. Osama bin laden had as a deputy from the very beginning in the 80s and 90s this man, egyptian ayman alzarqawi. When the hard drive was published from a camp in afghanistan we could see was functioning as the deputy. Everyone assumed he would take over. Most people did when Osama Bin Laden died and he did so and the oath of allegiance made by these subsidiary groups to ayman alzarqawi, he might not have all the organizational abilities and might be less of a leader but he is important and has been a leader for decades in terrorism and he has been one of the leaders in al qaeda for decades too so it is important to keep a fixed on him. My assessment in the book is there are things the president is doing very well. His opportunities and job difficulties are enormous. I think he has done well to impose sanctions on iran. I hope we stick with those and not give them up. I am glad he identified the revolutionary guards as part of the problem. I am glad he pursued the fusion of intelligence and defense assets and i approve that and the president is smart to keep them on that. There are some other things that were not doing so well and the book makes a few modest recommendations. In short what we are looking at is a long war. It is all long war. What the Heritage Foundation said it was going to be many years ago. It is not a perpetual war and no one wants it. It is not necessary to have a perpetual war but it is a long war and certainly until the leader of al qaeda, ayman alzarqawi, is caught or capt. Messages we are still in a state of war and we ought to be. Steven . [applause] we have a few minutes for questions. I would ask you to raise your hand. I will recognize you. One of our folks will give you a microphone. Identify yourself briefly and please ask a question. If i dont hear a question mark at the end of the second since i will ask you to stop because of you want to give a presentation, see me afterwards and we will arrange for it but we have Christopher Harmon for today. I am a law student at american university. My question is in regards to this long war you referred to. I would like to get your comments about what would you say to the people who say we have been losing the war for the last 13 years . If we continue down this path we are never going to win even if you capture one or two people the al qaeda threat you formulated is apparently appearing everywhere around the world. I would like to get your comments specifically about losing the war. I dont think theres much evidence we are losing the war. You are right, probably i disagree the way i attack this organization, the way i did when i spoke here in may of 2000 war talk about al qaeda having two centuries of gravity. If you know that phrase, he absolutely does in the analysis, more than one center of gravity hopefully able to narrow it to one but sometimes we cant. One center of gravity is the core Operational Capability which ayman alzarqawi has always led starting especially in the formal merger of the jihad with al qaeda in 2001 before the attacks and all those operatives and personnel who very often have been costs are at in custody in guantanamo or in jails in afghanistan and so forth and hundred of those have been caught. Many of the most talented or had direct role in planning and executing operations. All of those people the catching of those is a sort of victory but the International Community is a lurch in capturing those when they come through territory so i think that part of it is impressive. The other side is as you suggest the recreations of others, raising of new terrorists. This isnt anything about religion necessary although that is central to their ideology but if we look at phases of the red brigades in italy or the Irish Republican Army theres always a process of regeneration. On that account i think we are doing very badly. I dont know we are losing but not making head way. What we have been talking about, Public Diplomacy for years but we are actually not showing new arguments, determination that we need to make that succeed so in that way we made variable progress and i dont think this administration is going to do any better than the last one on Public Diplomacy. This gentleman and we will get you next. Since your strategy area you talk about things you mentioned non sexy programs like the trading week in other countries, closing up capabilities or Terrorism Financing which helped a lot of money and you mention the budget has been cut since the george bush administration. What you see as the role of these kinetic programs as to why it is so hard to get funding levels sustained by congress. Thank you. You were careful to say on the skin you hadnt seen that but on close reading you will be happy to know there is a section in what we can do on strategy, our partners can catch terrorists too. I think you are right and you spend your career, the interesting thing is when we look at the Drug Enforcement agency, Defense Intelligence agency, we look at so many parts of operating forces, military forces many are involved with these liaisons abroad which are not understood by the public so for example five academies around the world our lawenforcement training academies and you will get this wonderful joint combination of the fellow from the bureau, somebody from treasury that is an expert on terrorist finance and special forces and some International Perspectives and in places like bangkok these things run all the time. Budapest, bangkok, 5 of these. And a long procession of speakers, year after year our allies count and carters Council Working this internationally we are creating an International Network just like the terrorists have an International Network themselves. My last job in europe ending in 10 was with a program that has 1400 graduates from all over the world, all professionals in counterterrorism. The germans and the u. S. Make Tremendous Investments in this respect and i am optimistic about the yield. I am with e i our executive intelligence review and this is a two part question, getting at what you said about terrorism. The overarching question with the two is what is your view of following the money. Walter jones from North Carolina and stephen from massachusetts cosponsored a House Resolution to declassify the 20 pages of the 9 11 Commission Report which in their review of pages they said reviewed the foreign financing for the 9 11 attacks points to saudi arabia. The second part of the question is your view of auditing certain banks, hsbc, and other banks known to be taking part in the financing, the violation of antiterrorism. The hsbc case was the most recent study done in the senate. What is your view . It is the good question especially as it was part of miss crass to i agree with the current federal effort to get at the sources of terrorist financing. That is hard to do. I never its say things like money is the lifeblood of terrorism or cutting off the money supply as we can strangle terrorism. That is a gross overstatement and politicians should never say this, like being ejected in the mayors job in the big city and say i absolutely end crime and if you come back in two years you will we wouldnt believe it nor should we. Terrorism is important. Is something in terrorism you have to have some money. Doesnt take much to do something in the West Gate Mall attack in kenya recently. Something like that can be quite cheap. It can be a long elapse arrest process but for andrews simple ugly thing like one man with a couple machetes outside the British Army Base in london a couple months back. That is cheap terrorism. Will never be the essence of it but it is a grand strategy. You know how the bali bombing was . This is an incredible thing, a double bombing where they bombed a bar to drive people into a Public Square and that is where the major bomb was waiting but the damage looks like the luftwaffe had just hit the city and the way that was broken was through financial forensics. At some point some of the money came in to an atm and to disburse the money these fools went down there together so theyre looking into the picture waiting for their share so by sending one atms lipitor these were able to get to the bottom of the case. It is never they easy but it was in that case. There are a lot of reasons it is worth it. We should never overblow of a payoff. Is part of the grand strategy, it will never work is easily as it did. If i wanted to i have to tell you as a former special courses officer i was greatly heightened the first time i went to u. S. Special Operations Command said, global synchronization conferences at the amount of focus they put on the terrorist financing aspect and how it could lead to other operations and stopping those things from going on. It is an enormous part, i would never discount how much of that they are doing. Might not put it out on the general public but there is a lot of effort across the u. S. Government and in conjunction with allies. Is a major track of counterterrorism efforts. There are four books on that but this newest one, treasury score is a fine piece of work and we can learn a lot by looking at the way he addressed this problem. The gentleman in the back. The Heritage Foundation. You talked about Public Diplomacy and the fact that it seems we are not doing it so much. Some examples of if there are Public Diplomacy efforts that are working in counterterrorism as well as efforts we should be implementing. Yes. The opportunities are wideopen. Some of them we explored during the cold war so good congressman whom many of you would know like jack kemp and jim quarter exploited the ideas in a way of american democracy by doing things, by supporting international broadcasting, worked at u. S. Information agencys. I was in warsaw for the first time in my life and was able to buy an old yellow copy of solidarity which we openly added to funding to during that crisis back in thes and it was very exciting to watch the way in which that funny Little Organization came out of nowhere and had an amazing effect. That was another case of having an amazing effect and that was just as important as the political side. These things can have the effect. People like andre ibsen and others say that we are ignorant and blind to the good effect we ourselves are having. We did not realize the kind of sundered this created over there in a world deprived of information what little we could provide was greatly important. We have mostly forgotten that and it is too bad and we have not only broken down the United States Information Agency but tried to build up some structures so the new Public Diplomacy team seemed to always have a pretty good budget. It is Something Like 800 million which is half the total Public Diplomacy budget, 800 million for broadcasting and such. We have a new television station aimed at the arabic speakers based in springfield. We have a new effort by the last secretary of state to get some things going on social media which is probably wise but in fact we have so far the leverett attention to technology, to budgets, to me the and you know what the problem is . We dont know what to say. We dont know what to say. We are embarrassed by many of the ideals that were the thrill of our founders. We are not sure how to frame the argument. We dont want to attack the jihadists who call themselves that because we think we will use the wrong words and alienate muslims. We fail frequently to give air time or to amplify the speech and argument of some very fine critics of the terrorists themselves who whar on the inside, the egyptian who helped raise bin laden. Many places, the defectors are very valuable. Folks like this who we can really work with and use more and we dont do that. We really have poverty of imagination on Public Diplomacy. The gentleman in the back. Do you think the ira talking to the microphone please. To you think the ira and the terrorists have gone away as a longterm problem . It is the question whether the group sort of ends. Sometimes they seem to end just change their name. I had hoped for example that the successful rendition of abdallah of in 1999 had quieted forever the pkk, the kurdish workers party. I was sort of half wrong. We got five years of peace in that theatre which i think was welcome to the turks and other kurds, but in fact they manage after name changes and other kinds of work to creep back with the Irish Republican Army we have seen an incredible breakthrough. You have people like Martin Mcguinness and gerry adams taking senior posts or in adams case he is an m p in the southern republic. When you have people like that get out of the fight advising others to get out of the flight you have a real ground changer and that is exciting but there are remnants. Some are older and some are very young and they think guys like adams are pacifiers, appeasers but i dont think the irish case will blow up again. With respect to et a high or get a couple years ago that organization is dying and that is not a small thing. It was founded at the end of the 1950s, it has been an attempt to make insurgency, has political and terrorist dimensions but right now there are hundreds of those people in jail in spain and france and they publish a rejection of violence as not the way to go. The spanish have also compromised them by encouraging pacific nationalism and roughly opposing terrorists with lawenforcement, proscription of their political fronts and you have actually a Great Success story by a couple democracies here with the irish and the spanish. There are ways to do this. Is not balance to military things. It is as much as anything lawenforcement. Involves persistence, leadership, clinging to the higher ideals of Democratic Politics and refusing to let terrorism be an alternative to Democratic Politics and the leaders in spain have done that. The leaders in old italy did that too so there are some good success stories. We have one from our group watching on live video. This is from adam johnson. He says the speaker implies we are still at war. Said we were still at war. If al qaeda is religiously inspired and we are still fighting them, wouldnt we be there for him in a religiously inspired work carried out by military means . Carried out by terrorism means, not military. Most states in the world have forces that have guns and are not terrorists because of that. A lot of terrorists by the way might where some parts of uniform or do certain things that seem they would wish to be sustained but dont make this simple cuts defined by geneva so long ago, whether you are a legitimate belligerent. It is true the al qaeda guys are definitely inspired by religion. We of course make an obvious distinction between that faith which is islam and the extreme versions which are the heart of al qaeda. It is valuable to face those religious roots of the problem and one of the best ways to do that is simply open in addition of inspire magazine. There have been 10 or 11 of these so far after the editors were killed in a drone strike and subsequent issues and that lays out in very clear terms how they do their Public Diplomacy and how they hold to their religious beliefs and are willing to fight and die for them. They are religiously inspired. Our war is not. We got to remember as americans we fought with we defeated them by a long process of law enforcement, attrition and other things. We have resisted for years guys like the kkk who have very different motivations and there have been waves of kkk but whenever able to affect their real purpose is. We attacked communist terrorists within this country, groups like the weathermen, groups that have been beaten and. We went in the 80s, the fbi and others infiltrated the right wing, the militias and locked these guys in jail when did it with great skills so we have been many waves of terrorism that have nothing to do with religion. It is in the we have an obsession with religion in this war. We have an obsession with al qaeda which is an organized hostile entity that has attacked as repeatedly. Another question . Thank you for your presentation. Question regarding Public Diplomacy. In europe, asia and the belief they placed a high price on counter rhinology focusing on radicalization programs. Would you say in the tool kit the u. S. Has now those are areas to further explores or that we are doing that quite well, thank you. I dont think we are doing it well. The dutch are way ahead of us. The british are way ahead of us. We tried in this way vote Marshall Centers help many meetings on this, brought people together from our realm the world to decide how to do it better. In germany they do that. I think that it is very difficult to change peoples ideas and i think you have to have people that have the right arguments and sometimes the right qualifications so in an audience i have seen there is nothing as powerful as a member of one of those organizations that has quit. In the past with some of our wars we can take an example from this whether it is the first war in the philippines at the turn of the century or the war that ended with louies surrender in 1950s. In both cases the commander of the opposition in our custody roadblocks and gave lecture tours and such and they actually talked about the prospects of the philippines being a partner of the americans without being subservient. It was incredible Public Diplomacy and they have a kind of credibility that no professor from university x why can have. That is a good example of how we can do far better. In terms of the radicalization some successes by saudis and other countries but some losses. Recidivism is a problem in prisons and a problem in terrorism too so you i never absolutely cernan you have changed the mans views. There are some good cases and the saudis work hard on this because they are stunned by the fact that many of the dollars and al qaeda came from various moneys, usually private in saudi arabia and other places and they want to fight back and they also got stung by Al Qaeda Allies like hezbollah that are not formally allied that terrorist groups have stung the saudis and try to overcome them too. This can be part of a grand strategy and is one of many areas in which we americans have much to learn from partners. They are sometimes ahead of us. I will exercise moderator prerogative and ask the last question and let you answer it and take it wherever you want to do your wrapup and conclude and i will steal this from your intro. Americans are very performance oriented. We like to finish this thing, be done, walkaway and move on to the next event. Will we ever be able to say we have defeated terrorism . I dont think so. The method, the idea of it is introduced into International Politics in a couple periods including the period i mentioned which is fascinating and is useful to study because of certain similarities with other organizations, International Demand such. The years of 1880, 1900, are not all lost on us as we think about this but i dont think especially since 1968 it is likely to say we wont see terrorism. Unfortunately it works in many respects. It often works tactically. It often works operationally. Sometimes it even works strategically. We all know the National Liberation front in algeria that beat france is a nationalist organization and in some ways a legitimate one and they were practitioners of terrorism in the worst way, introducing plastic bombings in Public Places and such. They won. They won. They won and their party held sway in the parliament in algiers for another couple of decades and there are other groups that won too so this is a pressing threat strategically but also at lower levels it seems to me there is too often going to be people who have seen some of those models and want to do that and they think it works and in many respects it has worked. So we have to continue to push back in a moderate way and a professional way, well informed by art and science and backed up by will power because after all terrorism is in many respects a test of our wills. I think all of you have realized by virtue of you coming to this that this is an issue that has not gone away. I would love to say that our president , mr. Obama, was correct when he said we cant be at war forever, we just have to end this thing. I wish that were the way the world worked. But mr. President , i am sorry, both sides have to stop in a war. As chris has discussed today the other side hasnt decided to stop yet. That means we need to stay involved as well. I asked you to join me in thanking chris for great presentation. [applause] he is going to stay here to sign any books. Anyone who purchased one outside can bring it back and he would be happy to sign it. Thanks for being here at heritage with us. Booktv is on facebook . Interact with booktv guest endures as get uptodate information on events
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