Our heritagerg website as well as those of us will be joining us on cspan book tv in the future. We ask everyone inhouse if you make that last check that our mobile devices have been silenced or turned off comments always appreciated by the speakers. And for those watching on line you are welcome to send questions and comments any time by simply emailing speaker heritage. Org. We have copies of defeating jihad available here in the lobby if you would care to purchase one holdin one followie programming they know the guests will be glad to autograph them as well. Hosting the discussion in opening the session today is doctor cara that serves as the institute for National Security and Foreign Policy and is also the richardson fellow here at heritage. [applause] doctor gorka serbs at the university so full disclosure, the said chair is supported by the Marine Corps University Foundation Trustee which is a fabulous organization if you want to check it out and make a donation, that would be great. When he gets to talk you well understand why they do such great work and bring this incredibly accomplished scholar to work at the Marine Corps University. It is an extraordinary university. We are proud of that. Hes also a professor with the u. S. Special operations with u. S. Special operations command, joint special Operations University where he serves as the legal instructor for the special operations combating terrorism and more importantly he is offered over 140 monographs, book chapters and writings on this broad swath of issues that deals with this extremism and global terrorism. I think the most important credential i would defy you to go into the office or one of the intelligence agencies or any combatant command around the world or any of the services and find somebody that hasnt sent in a briefing with gorka. He is the man that brief the people fighting this war on the realities and his observations in an rss. The book how to deal with this long war which seems like its just getting longer all the time i think its for people that care about this issue and about the country and its security and the challenges to the peace and prosperity in the world today can and we ought to take time out and listen to hear what he has to say. We are excited to host him here today. So hes going to talk for a bit and then take questions. If you have a question, if you would raise our hand, an your hi think just recognize we have microphones if he would wait for the microphone so the folks that are listening online can hear the question and then state your name and affiliation. Please join me in welcoming gorka. Thats an introduction my father would have been proud of and my mother would have believed. [laughter] i wouldnt have my incredible position at the university or have been able to write this book without the support of tom sanders comes with the family found my position at mcu and made the writing of this book possible. Logistically, my team here is also present in closing my editor. So, tom and everybody else, thank you for giving me past the finish line. Let me talk about why i wrote this book. To understand the ideology of the group sai groups of it is ar isys today. I grew up in the middle east and the arab culture is the experience of my family under communism. So my family lived in hungary and the communist dictatorship, and my father was actually responsible for creating a secret Christian Catholic underground organization. They were feeding the intelligence to the west and the reports were landing on the desk of the one. They were betrayed from london and as a result of the age of 20 my father got a life sentence. Starting with two years in solitary and two years down the coal mine after that. This is the story with which i open my book i didnt want to do it, but my wife said america would love a good story so i opened up with my father. And my father being liberated from the communist political prison from 1956, escaping across the minefield into austria and then finally making their way out to the west, my father though he had been betrayed when they asked him where do you want to go, he said the United Kingdom so thats how they ended up in the uk and how i was born a british citizen and eventually moved to hungary after the fall of communism, but now im a very proud american citizen. I let found this a very simple one. I grew up with the mothers milk of freedom and democracy just instilled in me from day one. Because my father escaped from the communist dictatorship in prison, i understood before i could walk the fragility of liberty and the importance of liberty and how fragile it is and how Ronald Reagan was absolutely correct that the loss of liberty is one generation away. Years ago like today it was beautiful clear skies. When i saw them flying into the twin towers of the world trade center, i viscerally understood that to be totalitarians are back. They may not be communists, but they are to solitary them. If you read the work that informed of the groups like isys or al qaeda, it is true that america is once again facing a global totalitarian ideology. In the 20th century, we vanquished the totalitarianism and hitlers third reich and the soviet union and marxism. Today we are facing a similar ideology that sees itself in a global them or us competition. Its no accident that the ones i detail in the book. One of the most influential of the story begins with him as an egyptian hes the most important thinker of the Muslim Brotherhood. His seminal work of milestones is a very, very strong concatenation and mixture of fascism or communism all wrapped up in the religion of islam and its these people you must read and understand if you wish to understand the threats to america and why it is an existential threat. These people will not be negotiated. Anybody that thinks you can sit down with either alabama or al qaeda or isys and negotiate about your future. The only thing you can negotiate about is how you will be killed. Will you be enslaved as a person that isnt recognized as a human being because youre not a muslim that is the reality. Its completely analogous when attempting to negotiate with hitler it doesnt work. You can negotiate with the fascists about what they will put you in and thats about the extent of the negotiation and we are again in this world. The rest of the world is beyond my game plan on how to defeat them and it starts with the lessons that said if you wish to win a war you must know your enemy. We do not know our enemy. We have Political Correctness out of control. The last 15 years unfortunately it started in the Bush Administration but now it has reached cataclysmic proportions when the white house and the unclassified memo five years ago banned the discussion of religion and counterterrorism training for the fbi or the military are saying that the word jihad was prohibited, we entered a new age in which it would become impossible to effectively win the war. A student of mine stated in his dissertation, and he will go unnamed, when the enemy gets the control of what youre about to say about them, youve already lost the war. Thats where we are today. When a man in traditional arabic dress run broadens out the cruir in philadelphia and throws the semi automati automatic at a pon and says this the glory of god and the mayor of philadelphia says its just a crime it has nothing to do with religion, then we are living in a monty python fantasy absurdity. The fact is you can only defeat the enemy if you understand them on your own terms. When they say bitte they are fi, you do not get to wipe that out of your threat assessment. If you do that you are censoring the intelligence cycle. It would be as if somebody said as we are preparing to storm the normandy beaches if somebody said that during world war ii, i know your rifle is ready but whatever you do, when you land, dont mention the word not because you could offend a german. Thats the absurdity of the situation youre living in it has to stop. This is the template that was successful but in the cold war. We want the war against the totalitarian ideology that with the secret documents that have since been declassified and i use these as a starting point from my strategy the first one is the famous telegram of George Kennans secret telegram the 14 page from moscow to washington in 1946 that explain who is the soviet union and what does stalin believe and why is he behaving in ways that are antithetical to the postwar peace of europe . That was the enemy threat of doctrine and analysis. It was an incredibly accurate description of what was called the personality of the soviet union that made it clear this nation and its allies are motivated by the ideology that will not stop unless we are destroyed and that is why this is a union i is mx essential threat to america and western allies. How did we go onto the analysis of who the enemy is . They were tasked by the administration and the document National Security council 68 he wrote a plan on how to defeat the soviet union from the outside and helped to defeat it from the inside by delegitimizing its ideology. That document was unlike any document ive ever seen. Let me read to you if i may one short segment from the beginning. In the book i actually reproduce both of those documents in their entirety in the back of the book so you can read them. Them. But let me give you an opening of the section and ask yourself a question. When i read these words to you from the topsecret Government Strategy to ask yourself how many times you hear language like this today in the unclassified documents and statements from the rose garden, tell me if we talk like this anymore. Its laid down in the preamble to the constitution to form a more Perfect Union established justice, insure domestic tranquility, provide for the common defense, promote the general welfare and secure the blessings of liberty to ourselves andur posterity. In essence, the fundamental purpose is to ensure the vitality of our society which is founded upon the dignity and worth of the individual. Do we have government documents that talk about the dignity and the worth of the individual, the blessings of liberty . We understood back then the Founding Fathers built this nation upon and we need to reinvigorate and remind ourselves that it is organizations like isis or al qaeda that denied these fundamental truths and are therefore an existential threat to the united states. So, what is to be done . I worked for five years, six years, too long. And as a result i am a little bit infected but i am a recovering powerpoint user select me share two slides with you. What is the message of my book . Of course i would like you to purchase it but here is a very simple message. Al qaeda and isis is another form of totalitarianism. It has to be recognized as such. Its not a function of poverty or lack of education or what the administration likes to call the grievances. What was the lack of political enfranchisement. It was a very welltodo manager and the golf. Not sure i understand what the local grievances are these individuals got beheaded fellow human beings on camera. Second, america has defeated totalitarians before, and he can do it again. Let me be explicit on this, it is no accident that it took americas involvement in the leadership in both world war ii and the cold war to defeat the nazis and the communists that is not an accident. Its a function of the fact that we are the only nation founded on the principles of liberty, freedom and dignity of human beings based upon them being made in the image of their creator. This is not an accident. This will be the utilitarian enemy. But only if we can remove the Political Correctness from the threat assessment and understand the stakes of this war. They are total and global. Its easy to prove isis then its ideals of caliphate and bureaucracy. There are 6 Million People living on the territory of the caliphate today. Theres the thousand armed jihadis. Thats not a theory or crazy idea of a man in a cave somewhere and if they reality. Theyve already issued manuals of the Islamic State on what you can and cannot do with your slaves explicitly sex slaves that you now own. Im going to get political if i may for a second because i dont work for the u. S. Government anymore. Why is it we are talking about. The name. Herriot tubman when women are being sold into sex slavery now . Do some people tv and congress, obsessing about slavery in america over a century ago but when it is happening today. There needs to be an understanding of what is going on in the world. So what is to be done to quote a certain individuals that may be familiar to you, number one, we have to be honest about who the enemy is and what they want. No more censorship. Lets get politic out of National Security. The idea that you are not allowed to talk about the enemy they use themselves, that must end. Also, we have to be honest its not a function of poverty or lack of political enfranchisement but that it is pure evil. It is the incarnate evil that we see in isis. There are other problems i will admit. Russia is a spoiler and north korea, but not climate change. Crucifixions and beheadings based upon what religion you profess, that is the primary problem. Problem. Get censorship out of the threat assessment and allow the professionals to do. Theyrthey are the primary victt us be clear the majority of People Killed by the movement are ductile muslims. The jordanian Fighter Pilot burned alive in th and the primy enemy of these individuals as a result on the front line like egypt to be the face of this war but as anyone that served in the region knows, that will never happen. It will never happen the way it self. You will not see this one that has been created today by the administration. 61 nations . There were to come in a 61. Lets talk about the reality come and the coalition to go and fight on the ground to recapture the places will never happen unless those governments and those people trust that they are behind them all the way and they have their fix as they say in the military. They do not trust America Today and you know what . If i were sunni moderates neither would i. After the last 15 years and especially after the last seven and a half. We need to have the next commanderinchief rebuild the bridges that have been burned to the ground. Theres 150 billion with the conclusion that we dont care. Obama be one o one of the team f the solution on the front line and then last and very explicitly in the cold war. We need a push in the propaganda and information domain. We are not present on the battlefield of ideas. Im not denigrating the work of a psychological operations units at fort bragg i know them intimately but they are limited and corralled. At the whitthe white house drivr propaganda campaign. Ultimately delegitimize the ideology of global jihad because this is our problem from the streets of paris to brussels, jihad is a lifestyle that is far too popular and when you have the director of the fbi testify openly that isis is more than 20,000 platforms and is posting more than 50,000 social media postings every day, its time that we started to push back. Only then when it becomes unpopular and when we support the islam that is portrayed by the jordanian colleagues that we will eventually win this war and defeat the new totalitarians. So that is my plan in a nutshell. If you have any questions or want to know more about the book, its available outside. My website has lots of information about the book and everything that we do. If you want to know, the company my wife and i run on the domestic threat in case you were still wondering about how serious the threat is, and that is also available online. So that is half an hour roughly. We have time for questions from the floor if they are being emailed him. This wathe floor is all yours. One question you mentioned [inaudible] thats the 64,000dollar question. What sort of developments do you see . When have we seen them function in ways that are commensurate with the standards of liberty, democracy and Representative Government or at least the rights of the individual . To be honest, i see two functioning examples or largescale ones. The legacy and jordan are the ones that function and are stable and cherish the values that we cherish from the whole. What is special about these two policies, they dissolve the caliphate in 1924 and its explicitly said everybody can be muslim, thats fine. But you know what, im going to divest and disconnect islam and politics. Like the Founding Fathers in america you can be muslim but that is a private issue. It cannot inform the government functions and policies. So, a very aggressive separation was one model. The state department doesnt like an idea where the state defines what a religion can or cannot be and where the military model was one, the turkish army is going to be the protector of republican identity. The idea that the guys in uniform are going to be that guarantors. But nevertheless, it worked until he came to power. Then we have the jordanians. Why is it so easy to work with them, why is the military so good, why are they such strong allies in the fight against is isis . When you have a family that provides certain credentials when mccain says you should do this and show them to do that, it has a certain weight but somebody else doesnt have command of course the military and the royal elite are trained here. The fact is they are socialized with the western values as individuals and then they have a credential that really cannot be gained easily by the extremists. Those are the two options. Those cannot be replicated. Unless you give the ball to jordan. You have to have a secularized nation and a legacy that is transposed. Ive spoken to him for hours. If you read his dissertation from carlisle is clear they are trying to wrestle with the question of democracy. Its what i did with the Muslim Brotherhood because i am an egyptian before im a muslim, then you understand what hes doing. Absolutely, great. But im not going to see my nation held hostage to an interpretation straight from the century. So if they try to reinvigorate the model but of course they are blackballed by this administration because he wore a uniform, i remember maybe it was president eisenhower he was a soldier before he was the presit i am a newly minted american. Before we go too far off, i want to touc touch that its moe becausbut its morebecause itsf refugee and 40 jordanian. About half love america and half hate america so can you talk about the way forward facing the stability back to the region. My wife and i visited jordan. There is an incredible amount of refugees that are almost cracking to maintain its economy. Let me note that Senior Police official that is responsible for the camp that has a Huge Population so we ask our due hou see this developing, and how long can you do this and he said look, we eventually need these people to go back to the country they came from. The answer is not to be forced to go and live somewhere else. Its for the conditions to allow them to go back. He said it makes no sense we cannot absorb these people and second, what sense does it make even further away from their homelands whether it is in europe or america that is not what the people deserve. And as the son of refugees, my parents may have become british citizens but when the wall fell, whawanted my kids to . What did my parents do . As soon as the wall fell, there werwere high and very end but wanted to go back to the land of their birth that they had been forced out of. So jordan is just one small actor in this theater that has done an amazing job in absorbing as many people as it has, but i tend to agree with the Police Officer the longterm reality or goal of any nation concerned for the individuals is not that they try to grow roots in the transplanted territories or they are pushe pushed even further ay from their homeland but eventually they will have to go back to their own nation and that will only happen with american leadership. Is it feasible that in the religion theres the confusion of all things but it was very clear that the two were completely different. So if it is feasible, are we talking about the work in the sense that maybe its because it is and workable. Youve raised a question i dont want to go down the rabbit hole but if you read it as i have, there is no passage people think the Founding Fathers separated church and state, wrong. When they said should you pay taxes come show me the coin. Separation of church and state. My kingdom is up here. And even st. Paul says obey your political leaders. So we dont have that moment in the islamic scripture and those that have the interpretation of islam i ask one simple question, who is mohammed. What did they fulfill in the caliphate . Number one, he said to be the last prophet of god, so hes a religious figure. Number two, hes the head of state. So it is completely the same and then the third the military leader rapping out just read the stories and the traditions of. Youve all seen the videos, what is the sign . It is the oneness of the faith. I think until the Muslim Brotherhood arrives, there is a way not to make diplomats happy that the model where the person that has the credentials you have elected me president and he decides what the religion is. We dont like the idea that the president is going to say what you can or cannot do as a muslim, but he says i dont care what it says on chapter nine verse 29, because what does it say . Kill the infidel. Chapter 929, these are the words of god to crash or enslave the infidel. I dont want to do that anymore. I want to be a member of nato. So thats how they become turkey eventually. So it is fragile and it depends on where they can maintain its credentials or its authority to impose its interpretation on the religion and of course we dont like it. I think that it is arrogance that we say our culture must define what they will do to join us in our global community. Thats the ultimate arrogance. Lets leave it up to people that are elected as to how to deal with this question [inaudible] the passage will you have for them and recommendations you have for them in case you get such a chance because to make peace, there are 20,000 physicians that are practicing a. They are muslims also. How can we come up with those thats lik thats like asking my father to address the commentor. We are not going to get that invitation and its pointless because ive been broadcasting and it makes no point for me to be there. I would ask them very simply where does the dignity of the individual come from, where does the dignity of the individual come from. Its purely a revelation. Can they talk about the natural law, we are getting into a special territory. I would like to get them on thee record about this truth comes from. Is it just from the koran because then you will see the wolf because its a sheeps clothing very rapidly if they are honest about these questions. So, lastly i would ask what is the role of religion in politi politics . Revelation and the role of politics. Ive ask questions, i wouldnt give them recommendations because i think they are on the wrong trajectory. Is their arrogance of ignorance that is a great question. It is easier to be arrogant if you are ignorant i dont think that they are stupid. That is as big a mistake as saying that al qaeda are crazy people. Not true. Its to say they are just a bunch of crazies. They have the plan. They have this strategy thats been percolating for 70 years. Just on the plaintiff isis do you realize the enormity of what happened. When a man that has named himself after the first mohammed walk south to the pulpit to the preaching location of the grand mosque in mosul and declare the reestablishment of the calipha caliphate, this is the ultimate game changer. Because for 90 years, the extremists have been trying to undo the caliphate and the scores of organizations were created starting with the Muslim Brotherhood and then moving on to al qaeda and the Islamic Jihad and all these organizations reestablishing the caliphate. Every single one of them failed. All of them failed to. Isis doesnt talk about it, they do it. Its not possible to overemphasize the significance that they succeeded where its failed and thats why i wrote this book because it isis is at the super bowl and they are going to walk away with the ring. They blasted out of the water. They felt on the Muslim Brotherhood. People need to understand. This is of something happening 8,000 miles away, ladies and gentlemen. In the last 18 months since the caliphate, we have 98 people arrested linked to isis. All over the country from texas to california to new jersey. The question of where the threat is i already answered. San bernardino, what did they do, they swore allegiance to the Islamic State as they executed the secondlargest attack since september 11. And the scary thing is 30 of the people that we have arrested have no intention of going anywhere. Half of them want to go to the middle east but 30 decided the best way to serve is to kill infidels on u. S. Soil. These are the unclassified facts of the matter about the threat to america is today. Do you remember isis got to the really big because we were obsessed with al qaeda and when they get kicked out of al qaeda, what happens . It doesnt matter then. He takes them in and builds the Islamic State, so we are doing it again. But al qaeda hasnt disappeared. They are more active than ever especially in africa. And right now this pressure to prove relevance because who has stolen the show, now isis is the cocacola of soft drinks. A al qaeda has to get back into the game. I dont think that he could quite swallow subordinating himself, so what do they do in the meantime . It may go even bigger if you want to improve the relevance it may not be enough and we co qaeda look at the weapons of mass destruction experimenting with the agents and the poisonous gases so al qaeda hasnt disappeared. The extremism is absurd. They use this extremism, no its not any kind, it is jihad islam in the movement they must appreciate that the movement has hundreds of members, organizations. So whether you are a member of al qaeda, these are all part of the same even hezbollah. Its just that competing branch of the interpretation of extremism. Before san bernardino, do they share the same ideology, thats the most important thing. So if that individual shared ideology whether it is fort hood for the boston bombers, that means that they are members of the same movement and that is the best label for it. Have you reflected on any role [inaudible] it is often brought up as the antidote. This seems very intuitively attractive and some of the nastiest and most violent sectors in the history of the religion were linked. So im not looking for the one antidote, im looking for the attitudes to the revelation and the most important question of dignity. What is the question of dignity and the human value, so certain aspects of it could be injected into the mold, but you wont convert the religion itself. So i understand the attraction but im not sure that by itself it is a game changer. Yes in the front please. Its difficult for me to understand having read the koran why we are seeing what we are seeing in the islamic world today. I do find it difficult to understand the response of the Current Administration and previous administrations how can we best put it in the proper context . Why did the Obama Administration gets to where it is today, one is to do with the worldview and the intelligence analysis. One looks at itself as very sophisticated, postmodern sql. Its probably the interpretation that religion is just a power trip by those in skirts whatever. Even if you go to church or temple or mosque, if you go to capitol hill and meet people over doughnuts and coffee, if the attitude to religion as the postmodern secular attitude to religion, you will not understand at all. I dont care what religion you hold. I realize working with the defense department, if you have faith they dont care if you are a buddhist if you dont have faith, you will never understand a jihadi. Its not this craziness when they take seven minutes to set for another human beings had from their neck that is the commitment that doesnt come from a paycheck. Cinema one, you cannot absorb and second, theres a moment in history that we have to address. The individual that is an academic specializing in radical islam and was hired by the National Counterterrorism center, this individual was lifted from the first Obama Administration white house and sold the white house on the following analysis and you can read this on the white paper behind the strategy and the Science Behind americas counterterrorism strategy. This individual soul the Administration Analysis in the world of radical islam. There are the people like al qaeda will actually kill you you up to. Only the brotherhood can save us from al qaeda. They both wants to destroy and we are helping people because we think they are going to kill us later . So the worldview giving power to the group that is as extreme, they just have a different methodology. But we could talk for hours. Wait for the microphone. If you search intranet the article number one and number two and also i listed all the violations and recommendations how to win, one of which is in the last resort, not the first and other things id recommend it. My question is about saudi arabia. They were helping at the beginning. They fund all of this extremism all over the place. We started in yemen killing thousands of innocent. It all comes from saudi arabia and there are muslim countries that youve mentioned, but question . How do you address those issues . In the book i deal explicitly with the most important year in the birth of modern jihad and that his 1979. If you want to understand the relationship with saudi arabia and the schizophrenic nation, you have to understand the siege of mecca. The book is available outside. But by the extremists against their fellow muslims they lead o the bargain between the house and certain clerics. Its a long story but its in the book. Thank you for your question. [applause] booktv continues tomorrow. I didnt host karen, another
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