[inaudible conversations] thank you very much for being here and i particularly want to thank chairman barrasso because he allowed us to have the subcommittee hearing and for me to chai chair if this is a discn thats important to all of us that are here and so many of our colleagues. Information is power today, and we see it all over the globe when its used improperly it is used as a weapon. Democracy requires wellinformed electorate to function properly but to undermine the principle through socalled Disinformation Campaigns designed to mislead voters and in doing so delegitimize the democratic elections. Actors like russia systematically exploit the media and to distort the truth to an unsuspecting populace with regards to the coronavirus and this information is being spread is a high degree and anonymous and again if left unchecked it could be devastatingly effective. I established this organization it could help lead to the global disinformation effort and work with International P
Thats important to all of us that are here and so many of our colleagues. Information is power today, and we see it all over the globe when its used improperly it is used as a weapon. Democracy requires wellinformed electorate to function properly but to undermine the principle through socalled Disinformation Campaigns designed to mislead voters and in doing so delegitimize the democratic elections. Actors like russia systematically exploit the media and to distort the truth to an unsuspecting populace with regards to the coronavirus and this information is being spread is a high degree and anonymous and again if left unchecked it could be devastatingly effective. I established this organization it could help lead to the global disinformation effort and work with International Partners. The Bipartisan Legislation within the state department is now the law and to get it up and going we will hear more about that today but we are pleased that we are making progress. They lead, synchronize
Thank you very much for being here, and i want to thank him because he graciously allowed to have the subcommittee hearing and for me to be able to chair it. This is a discussion really important to so many of us here and so many of our colleagues. Information is power today, and we see it all over the globe when its used improperly, hes used as a weapon. Democracies like ours require a well informed electorate, but our enemies are increasingly trying to undermine that principle through socalled disinformation campaigns designed to mislead voters. Malign actors like russia systematically exploit social media, radio, television, and print to twist facts to suit their needs and distort the truth to an unsuspecting populous. Its not just about elections. We see it today with regard to the coronavirus and misinformation thats being spread. Its an interesting tactic because its inexpensive and yet can be very effective. It has a high degree of deniability. Its anonymous almost always and if
I want to thank our witnesses, secretary esper, chairman of the joint chiefs of staff milley for appearing before us to testify. The purpose of this hearing is to discuss our policy in syria particularly in light of the events that happened when turkey invaded and drove the kurds out of portions. Our first hearing since the congressman from new york joined the committee. I want to thank him. We have a lot of new faces in this committee that are a year into it. They are not new faces anymore but good to have another freshman added to the committee. I appreciate him serving. The purpose of this hearing is to look at events around syria. A whole bunch of questions and the other big issue is the ability of memories of this committee to ask questions of the key policymake is in an area of importance to the committee and to give them an opportunity to learn more about the policy and express their views and that is a huge part of our oversight role in congress and it is enormously important.
Dont think donald trump will move on tariffs or lift all of the tariffs, which is a chinese demand. As we set up for the phase one deal and President Trump tweeting out of the u. S. And china were working on finding a new location for a signing ceremony now that the summit has been canceled because of unrest in chile, we need to think beyond that. We are seeing criticism of the content of that phase i deal. David lets assume for the moment it plays out the way your reporting is indicating. They get the phase one has a truth, we dont increase tariffs or cut them back, what does the United States get out of that and one does not get . Shawn it gets a return to purchases by china at levels that were there before the whole trade war started, before these tariffs went into place. We are expecting intellectualproperty concessions by the chinese, although a lot of experts are looking at what might come out of that and saying that looks a lot like what china is doing already. There might be ot