embassy, got over the fence, set fire to vehicles and did a lot of damage. my analysts believe the guys in benghazi, bad guys come absolute bad guys terrorists, saw what happened in cairo and said let's go do the same thing for the sake of our facility. and they did the assault on the state department facility and then they followed the state department guys come the state department facility to the cia facility conducted an attack immediately in the cia's facility and were pulled by my security guys. they came back four hours later with much heavier works. one of the questions you have to ask yourself is people have pointed to these borders as this is evidence of pre-planning. this is evidence and the effectiveness of the mortar fire. one of the questions you have to ask yourself is if there was a lot of preplanning why didn't they bring those borders to the first attack against the state department facility for the first attack against the cia facility. why did they wait until almost nine hours later? the answer to that question is because they just went last-minute. people say they brought five mortars and three of them are affected. my question was why did they only bring five? libya was a country awash in mortars. why did they only bring five? they had time to fire a lot more than five. the answer, that's all they brought. that's all they could find in the short period of time. >> the question here, the issue that you raised in the book is is. >> absolutely not. these were caused by the analysts and one of the things that everybody needs to know about analysts in the cia is it takes great pride to call and things like they see it. they take great pride in telling policymakers you are wrong about something. they actually like to stick their finger in the policymakers eye. you are wrong wrong wrong about that. there was no political influence on the analysis here. i do know the analysts and some folks have claimed. the analyst did their jobs. director petraeus and i defended the analysts. we believe that the analyst had to say. director petraeus admitted the next day the principles meeting he believe, i believe the analysts and like i said most of their judgments have held up including the fact that there was little preplanning. i've never seen significant evidence of preplanning. >> we are going to move on to the iraq war. he wrote in your book talking about secretary of state colin powell on a number of occasions in recent years secretary powell has -- should grant by harming him without intelligence of his u.n. speech. the cia and the broader intelligence committee clearly failed him so someone in the chain of command at the time of the iraq wmd -- i would like to use this opportunity to publicly apologize. >> there were two big, at the time of the month leading up to the iraq war there were two big intelligence judgments. one is what was the status of weapons of mass destruction program and the second was what was the relationship between iraq and al qaeda? on the first vote was the status of his weapons of mass destruction program? the analysts in the entire u.s. intelligence, in fact the analysts in every intelligence service on the planet had looked at the question. they came to the same conclusion this guy had chemical weapons. this guy has a biologic weapon production capability and this guy is reconstituting a nuclear weapons program. that's what the analysts believe. they turned out to be wrong. all of the people looked at this question and turned out to be wrong and we can talk about why if you want to but it turned out to be wrong. the reason i apologize to colin powell is twofold. one is i think colin powell is a remarkable individual. i think he served his country with great distinction in job after job after job. he deserves the stellar reputation. his u.n. speech and he did not say anything that the cia and the rest of the intelligence community did not leave. this tarnished his reputation. he's the first person to tell you that. i've heard him say that iraq wmd presentation to the u.n. -- he carried this with him. i've also heard him say that nobody from the cia ever apologize. i was number three on the analytic side who did this analysis that we got wrong. and so given all of that i wanted to apologize and i also did want to surprise him. i didn't want him to got the book and see that he was in there so i sent him a chapter at a time. we talked for 45 minutes and he was deeply appreciative. >> would you agree that the war was sold on the basis of wmd weapons? >> i wouldn't say so. >> i didn't mean it in a negative way. >> president bush would have to tell you himself and is very important, one of the main jobs of an analyst and one of the things i try to do in the book is put some of the big decisions in context. what was the context in which president bush made them? 9/11 had just happened. the largest single attack on america. 3000 people killed. the cia was telling him that saddam hussein one of our primary enemies a sworn enemy of the united states had active weapons of mass destruction programs including a nuclear weapon program and we were telling him that saddam hussein supported international terrorist groups, not al qaeda and we can talk about that if you want palestinian terrorist groups. so there says president bush having faces huge attack on the united states understanding job number one at the president is to protect the american people and we are telling him this guy has weapons of mass destruction and support to terrorist groups. he's sitting there thinking, you know if saddam uses these weapons against us or if saddam gives these weapons to terrorist group and they use these weapons against us that could make 9/11 look small. i think that's what drove president bush to action in iraq and it's exactly what led a majority of congress to support him, for exactly the same reason. absolutely the analysis on iraq having weapons of mass destruction played into it no doubt about it. >> these are tough calls and nobody gets them all right but does the cia have an observation to do more to find out where rather than based upon circumstantial evidence? >> great question. when you read about when you read about the intelligence failure that i was iraq and weapons of mass destruction you will read mostly about the failed analysis. in fact there have been books about it. academics have written articles. there have been studies and i've read it all. i was involved in this and i have read it all. part of the failure here was something that never gets talked about. part of the failure here was not just the analysts at the cia but the people at the cia responsible for collecting the data. the people at the cia who were responsible for recruiting other human beings to spy on the united states. they were not successful in getting a human agent close enough to saddam's inner circle to find out what saddam was really doing. but he was really doing was believing the only way he could get out from under sanctions was to get rid of his weapons program. he believed the cia would see that. the cia would tell the president about it. the president would get rid of sanctions and he didn't want anybody else to know that he had gotten rid of these programs. they were a deterrent to this main enemy of loan so he wanted it to be a secret that he had got part of the program. and by the way he planned all along to eventually go back to his weapons programs after sanctions went away. how do we know this? because he told us this. after he was captured we have long discussions with him and he told us exactly what he was saying so it turns out he overestimated the capabilities interestingly enough. >> the part that deals with having access to redeveloping nuclear weapons my understanding is it was based around iraq acquired aluminum casement that were often used in that process. but it was also used for other things. >> look the aluminum tubes and we can talk about aluminum tubes if you want. i don't know that we need to. just let me say this. that was one of the factors that led the analyst to the nuclear conclusion. there were a lot of others. the department of energy which concurred to the judgment that saddam was reconstituting his nuclear weapons program didn't buy the aluminum tubes or aluminum tubes are gaba thought the rest of the evidence was strong enough to make that judgment. >> to the cia ever do an analysis of what to expect it to go to war in iraq and what the ultimate outcomes would be? >> we did it in different places. i think we owed president bush before he went to war we owed him what is called the national intelligence the lead analysis by the intelligence community. we owed him -- here are the implications if you go to war and here's what to expect in iraqi society, iraqi politics at the go-to war. here's what's important and here are the key factors that will determine whether this place become stable or unstable. we didn't pull it together in one place. >> is not a pretty picture. saddam hussein is gone. aside from that iran has now emerged as a power because iraq was the main power holding them back. isis and al qaeda had a field day and in your book you talk about that. now they are taking huge portions of terrorists. >> in the book what i say in the book is i really believe that the decision to invade iraq at the end of the day i don't think was a decision that brought about the instability in iraq. the decisions that brought about the instability in iraq were the d. bath vacation by the coalition provisional authority. after the military operations ended and we were in charge of iraq bremer was in charge of iraq the first few decisions of the coalition provisional authority were one to remove from from the government anybody who is a member of the baath party and to basically disband any organizations that had a very close relationship with the baath party. those two decisions resulted in the collapse of the iraqi military the iraqi security service and the iraqi intelligence service. all of them were members of the baath party and all of a sudden i didn't have jobs anymore. what did they do? a whole bunch of them went to work for al qaeda in iraq because they were mad number one and number two they got paid by those organizations. it was those two decisions that i think were the critical decisions that led to that. >> when you look back as a former member of the cia were you satisfied with how things work out in iraq's? >> of horse not. it's a mess. one of the things you have to think about what would the place look like what with the place look like today if we hadn't done that? you have to do the counterfactual. what would iraq look like today if we had not invaded iraq? who knows but let me give you a possibility. sanctions would eventually gone away without a doubt. there's no way that the united states would hold the sanctions together. they would have gone away. he would have restarted his weapons program and he would have had chemical weapons and he would have had a violet to go weapons capability and probably would have developed a nuclear weapon. either you would have had to have dealt with that if you saw it happening where he would have won. and then you fast-forward and you say okay what happened in tunisia, what happened in egypt, what happened in libya, what happened in syria in terms of the arab spring could have easily happened in iraq. in other words people rise up and say we want you to go away. you might have a country that has these weapons of mass distraction that have the same instability today that libya has. so you can't look back and say that if we hadn't done this that iraq wouldn't look like that today. he could easily look like it today with a nuclear weapon. >> one of the things you talk about was the politicalization of intelligence by the administration one democrat and one republican. in fact with regard to the lead-up to the iraq war you wrote about scooter libby and vice president cheney. libby's attempt to intimidate a cia official was the most weight and politicize intelligence i saw it in the business. it would not be the last attempt what impact does politicizing of intelligence have and does it distort what the cia is doing and is the cia able to stand up to the president say no? >> this is really important. bramborough said there were two big judgments on iraq prior to the war, weapons of mass distraction and then iraq and al qaeda. on iraq and al qaeda what we said was what the analysts believed was the there were some historic conversations between iraqi and intelligence and al qaeda but as of 2002 there was no current relationship between iraq and al qaeda. there was no iraqi involvement in 9/11. there was not even iraqi foreknowledge of 9/11. that's what we said. scooter libby did not like what we said. he believed there was a connection. he thought we were wrong and after he put this paper out the set wages he called up my boss and told her to a java paper and fix fix it because it was wrong. we just put our hands up and said no we are not doing that. i told you earlier we are not partisan and we call it like we see it. where the umpire, where the referee we call like we see it. we didn't budge. scooter libby called john mclaughlin v. director of the cia to complain about the paper and george tenet and john mclaughlin said no, stop. and president bush did something really important. my boss who scooter libby called and he refused he briefed president bush on christmas eve in 2002. went to camp david ended and did his daily intelligence briefing. at the end of that raising as he was getting up to go president bush said one more thing. i've heard about this issue regarding iraq and al qaeda. i've heard about the pressure on you guys. i just want you to know that i have your back and i want it to continue to call it like you see it. very, very important. but in my experience at 33 years i have never seen an analyst buckle under to anybody to try to get them to say anything that they don't believe. we trained analyst that way. they are proud of it. they really call it like it is. they don't budge to pressure. in fact the pressure strengthens the back end even more. >> talk about osama bin laden. some of his material was just released a few days ago, some of his notes and some the book that he was reading and so forth. he says al qaeda's sole opportunity in the arab spring which was something that the west didn't necessarily recognize. >> with regard to the arab spring there were a couple of things we got right. and there were a couple of things we got wrong. by the way one of the points i want to make here is that the work that the agencies have to do is really hard. the analysts only get the hard problems. they don't get the easy jobs. they only get the hard questions and they get most things right and occasionally they get some things wrong. it's really hard so arab spring. first of all we provided what we called strategic -- for years we had been telling the president, the national security team multiple congresses that there were pressures building in the arab world that were unsustainable. there were political pressures, economic pressures, demographic pressures, societal pressures that were built and and we wrote that over of years in depth. we provide strategic warning from the arab spring. what we didn't do one of things we didn't quite right is we didn't provide what we call tactical warnings. tactical warning as we think this place is going to blow up. we think we have reached the tipping point. that's very difficult to see coming. we didn't see it. we didn't write it. shame on us. we could have done a better job with social media to see what the arab spring about what was happening. we could have done a better job at that. once arab spring happened we got something really important right and we got something important wrong. the thing we got right was as soon as tunisia happened we said this has the potential to be a contagion. this has the potential to be a threat and that was the first real time. tunisia was the person we said it was going to spread before tunisia began to show. so we got that right, we nailed that the thing we didn't get quite right was the analysts said as soon as the arab spring started that the arab spring was going to undermine al qaeda. their argument was that it was going to undermine al qaeda because it was going to undercut their narrative that violence was necessary for political situations. they may have been right about that but what they missed were two other really powerful dynamics that turned out to make the arab spring and al qaeda spring which is the title of the book this particular dynamic. the two particular dynamics are number one the arab spring undercut the willingness of some arab countries like extremism inside their border. the best example is egypt under president morrissey were the guys who had fought tears for years in egypt still have their same capabilities. they didn't think they have the political cover anymore to fight terrorists and so they stopped. al qaeda came back to egypt for the first time. within a matter of weeks back in egypt. the other dynamic was you had countries who had a willingness to fight extremists inside their border but no longer have the capability. they were institution said were there to fight al qaeda and to fight extremists and were significantly weakened by the arabs bring. the best example libya where the post gadhafi government want to fight terrorism but the military was gone, the intelligence service was gone in the security service was gone. those two dynamics significantly overpower the dynamic. >> with some of the wishful thinking? for some of that we see the other parts of the worlds in our own image and the fact they're not? >> at the cia analysts have any bias it's seeing the glass half empty instead of half-full. >> i wish i could lighten things up. this is serious stuff. but talk about waterboarding. you talk about it at great length in the book. you talk about all of these so-called enhanced interrogation techniques which some critics call torture and the one that you point out that you had serious doubts about and reservations i've got the feeling you had bixby links about it's very this is a very important issue. the first thing you need to know is that this was not just the cia's program. this was america's program. what do i mean by that? the cia carried it out but it didn't go in the direction of the present of united states. it didn't go with the approval of the rest of the national security. it did so with the department of justice and we welcome back to that and it did so with the approval of the leadership of both intelligence committees of congress democrats and republicans. this was america's program. it's very appointed member that. these were not rogue cia operations. the second thing you talk about context in the iraq case. the context is again 9/11 cia had credible information that there was a second wave attack land. there was a second wave of attacks coming out of that the equivalent size of 9/11. the cia had information that did not go as credible or not but turned out to be true. osama bin laden was trying to get his hands on a nuclear weapon. the cia had information and did not go as credible or not but it turned out not to be that of qaeda was planning to drop a nuclear bomb on eric city. the level of threat in the oval office every morning was at the top assuming. george tenet and i used to walk into the oval office and say to ourselves as we were walking and is today the gate -- the day we are going to get hit again and? the other part of context is because of the pakistanis agreed to work with us against al qaeda the pakistanis started arresting senior al qaeda operatives. who we believed had information related to plots that we were telling the present about every morning. the senior al qaeda guys have interrogation -- and were not responding to traditional interrogation techniques. and the counterterrorism guy from the cia came to director tenet and said these guys know about these plots. traditional interrogation techniques aren't working and we think we have to try and hands to weeks. are they said we think americans are going to die. george tenet had the same conversation with the white house in the enhanced interrogation program. put yourselves in the shoes of george tenet really tough decision to make. let's take a look at it and break it down analytically. there are four questions that matter. one is was illegal? and i know there are debates about that now but at the time the department of justice that on multiple occasions this is not torture. this does not violate u.s. torture statute or u.s. treaty obligations with regard to torture. this is legal. this is not torture. they said that on multiple occasions. the department of justice. number two was it effective and i will be honest with you here there's a strong disagreement here between democrats on the senate intelligence committee which breach to report a couple of years ago they released publicly less than a year ago that says the cia did not get a single piece of useful information at the hands of terrorists. diane feinstein. the cia said just the opposite. the cia said enhanced interrogation techniques produced a boatload of intelligence that stopped attacks stopped attacks save lives and took additional senior al qaeda guys off the battlefield. where is michael morell on this? i didn't know about enhanced interrogation programs. by 2006 the director of at the time was trying to wind this thing down trying to find a way to end this program. we are not going going to be in this business for the long term. i didn't pay a lot of attention to the effect of this argument because essentially out of the business but i did pay attention to it in my last month on the job. as acting director and deputy director i was overseeing the agency's response to the diane feinstein and -- feinstein report. i really studied the issue and i can tell you i convince myself. i went into it with an open mind i wasn't trying to protect anybody pray when into with an open mind and i looked at it closely. i convince myself that they were absolutely effective. let me tell you why i came to that conclusion. i looked at information that the detainees provided before enhanced interrogation techniques. it was not full answers to questions. it was not specific information that was not actionable. after enhanced interrogation techniques specific information actionable information. no doubt in my mind the senate report was wrong in that report. the third question was it necessary calexicans be effective but not necessary. was it another way to get this information in the honest answer to that is we will never know. that is true with almost every decision that anybody makes. was it necessary to drop two atomic bombs on japan to bring about the time a surrender of the japanese at the end of world war ii? we will never know. was it necessary for abraham lincoln to -- to the civil war. we will never know. the last question is the most important. even if it's legal and even if it's effective is it the right thing to do? is it the right thing to do morally to inflict these harsh techniques on another human being? the first thing you have to look at as each techniques separately. you can't put them together. one of the techniques was simply grabbing somebody by the lapels if they weren't paying attention to during an interrogation. i'm not going to ask you to raise your hands but i'll bet the vast majority would. you have to look at each individual and the to all the way back to waterboarding. you go from the benign to extremely harsh when you asked this question about morality and right or wrong. a lot of people and by the way the senate report never dealt with this most difficult question, the morality question. the right and wrong question. never ever talked about it. some people think it's easy. some people look at one side of this morality coin and say how could the united states of america which stands for human freedom and dignity in the world do these things to another human being? some people make it sound easy but the other side to the morality coin is how could you not do these things? if you believe you need to do it in order to -- these are decisions that president made. now with regard to views on waterboarding if i were captured by the enemy and i worked grabbed by the lapels when i come back and say it was tortured? now. if i were captured by the enemy and i were waterboard or would i come back and say it was tortured? you bet i would. i'm uncomfortable with waterboarding. but here's my moral dilemma and i read about this in the book. here's my moral dilemma. when i was looking at the program in-depth and looking at the question of effectiveness you know what technique was by far the most detectable? waterboarding. the one i'm most comfortable with was the most affected. this is not easy at all. my final point is i do think this is something the american people need to know about. the media need to talk about it academics need to talk about it, historians you to talk about it. one of the country's responses to 9/11. i want all the facts out there. i want the real history of this program and what the senate produced, with the senate intelligence produced in the senate democrats produced isn't anywhere near close. i want the real history out there. >> we are going to take questions now from you and we have folks that have microphones roaming around. so maybe raise your hand. >> thank you dave. i have a question right here in the front row. >> thank you. scary interesting. if you were talking with analysts who is just starting out what one piece of advice would you give them? and what to book recommendations what would this be? >> great questions. the one piece of advice that i would give them is this really weird thing that i have done every day of my life ever since i started working which is when i went home at night at the end of the day i would ask myself how did you do today and how could you do better? in that conversation with myself i was harder on myself than i ever was. then i took the actions with a pretty harsh self-assessment. i think that is the reason why i have progressed as fast as i did because i learned a lot from what i did every day. i still do it. i will go back tonight and think about how did you do for the folks at the nixon library and how could he have done better? is just kind of how i'm wired and it would be my one piece of advice. to anybody in any job including being an analyst. in terms of books to read that's a really tough one. i would tell them to read "the great war of our time." >> i knew that was coming. that was a given. >> to tell them just to read as much as they possibly can and particularly about the part of the world that you are responsible for, read everything that has ever been written. one of the things one of the characteristics of a successful analyst is somebody who has what i call a -- they are not satisfied with with the surface. you want somebody who wants to read all of that stuff. you want to read everything that's ever been written. >> web question right here in the back row. >> my question is what is the value of addictive analytics such as products provided by volunteer futures? >> that's a good question. a lot of people think that the main job of the cia analyst is to protect the future and it's not. it's not at all. there are really two jobs. one job is to say what's happening today so what is the status of their rainy and nuclear program today? what is the capability of al qaeda in yemen today? what are they planning today? what's going on today and how do you think about it? that's the hope of the work that analysts do. when they do think about the future they don't predict the future. what they try to do is tell you the key factors that will determine what the future looks like. and that's a lot more important to a policymaker than getting a prediction of the future. because knowing the factors that will determine the future policymakers get ideas about what the future might look like create and simply saying here's what the future's going to look like and i can help. so if somebody can tell me what the future is going to look like i want to talk but i've never found anybody who can. so this approach talking about the factors that will determine the future is much more powerful. >> we have a question to your right. >> thanks for coming in today. my question is is it a possibility when benghazi was going on and the first thing that happened was kind of a roux because he didn't do anything about it. america doesn't care and maybe they were prepared to come in and do what they did. >> i don't think it was a roux. it isn't like we are going to test this on this and do more if they don't respond. that's not the way they think. they attacked the place and when there wasn't a response absolutely they would continue but is it's not like they tested it. certainly if there had been a response and a response is available they wouldn't have -- and that's absolutely right but that's not the way we talk about it. >> by the way there was a video of the attack. it was never released. >> it's never been released. the head of the intelligence community jim clapper was a great american was in favor of releasing the video. i think if you see the video you say oh that's on a military assault. that's more like a mob. i wanted that video out there solving american people could see it. >> who didn't want about there? >> i think there was a view that we don't want to release that kind of stuff. you don't want the president releasing it all the time. i can't tell you why. the only thing i can tell you is that jim and i were in favor of it. >> the gentleman to your left. director my question is what's your assessment of russia and the states in that region? >> it's a great question. context is everything so let me give you three pieces of context that are really important here to understand what russia is doing and what russia and ukraine is all about. the first piece of the context is the if you were here right now and you are all in this oligarch buddies and you asked him what you doing in ukraine he would tell you and he would use these words not from analytic construct of the cia. he would tell you i want to reestablish russian empire. i want to reestablish the russian empire. he would say i want to control or i want significant influence in every part of the world that used to be part of the russian empire which just happens to be matching up closely to former studies. this is what he wants as his legacy. this is long-term and by the way he thinks is going to be running that country the next 20 or 25 years. so that's the first thing. the second piece of context every part of this former soviet union and every part of it former russian union ukraine is particularly important for a couple of reasons. one is history. when the original russian state was founded in the ninth or tenth b.c. i never studied it ukraine was part of russia in the capital was in moscow. it was in kiev. if you are in russia you think of ukraine as part of russia. one part of this is history in the other part is ethnicity. the russians are slobs and the gradients are slobs and they think of themselves as brothers. the third is putin does have a great fear. vladimir putin's fear is the people of russia are going to wake up someday and have their own arab spring. they're going to come out in the streets of moscow and they are going to say we don't like the direction you are taking our country. we don't like you anymore. we want you to go away and we want a greater say. he is scared to death of that. where did that happen? it happened in slavic countries. he does not want to become -- he doesn't want to have would have been in kiev. so ukraine is really important in that context. the third piece of context is who is this guy and how does he think? i think bob gates put it best. when you look in his eyes you see kgb kgb, kgb. he is a thug. he is a thug is a bully. he only understands relative power strength and weakness. he does not believe something that every western businessman believes it is possible to sit down in a negotiation have a win-win outcome. he only believes in win/lose india's entrepreneurial risk-taking personality which means he's a risk-taker buddies a particular kind of risk-taker. when he takes a risk and believes he succeeds as he is done and the crane is often willing to take a bigger risk and that's why worry. he was willing to go to war in ukraine and we were not. but in the baltics i think nato was willing to go to war over the baltics. >> the gentleman in the second row. >> on weapons of mass distraction. people across well protected -- [inaudible] [inaudible] >> i think it was related to this program of biological warfare. >> i so wish that you are right on that program being shipped off -- shipped off to syria because then we would have been wrong. unfortunately there was never any evidence, real evidence of it being shipped to syria. the u.s. went in and couldn't find anything and we were wrong. i so wish you were right. >> we have time for one more question, right in the front row. >> of aikido just information about isolated like to know he said the baath soldiers were part of iso-. where are they coming from and why did iraq drop all of their equipment and run? >> that's a great question. some people call them eyes on some people call them isis and some people call them die sure. where do they come from? they came from what was called al qaeda in iraq. they simply change their name and we'll come to that in a second but al qaeda and iraq became a group after the u.s. invaded iraq and it became one of the opposing forces in the u.s. occupation. al qaeda in iraq. they got their man largely from the sunni population including some people that used to work for the iraqi government. and they ended up fighting the u.s. for long period of time. we ended up doing that from the battlefield. they ended up killing millions of americans. so by the time the united states left militarily left iraq in 2011 al qaeda in iraq was at its weakest point. .. that moderate -- started joining al quade in iraq. then the syrian civil war breaks out, and al quade in iraq wants to be part of the action in syria. they go does the bearder and change their anyway. you can't be fighting in syria and be called al quade in iraq. and they rebrand themselves and called themselves isis. and three things happened in syria that made them strong. the first was they got their hand on new recruits, syrian sunnies and foreign fighters who were flowing into syria to fight in the civil war join isis. so a lot more men. they also got their hands on a lot of money. the why you get money in the terrorism business is to be successful. that how you get donations and financing, by being successful. conducting an attack and obtaining territory. so they got a lot of money. and also got themselves a lot of weapons. they were overrunning a syrian government weapons stockpile. so they went from their weakest point at the end of 2011 to an incredibly strong position by late 2013, early 2014. they take a lot of territory in syria. and they go back into iraq and they do the blitzkrieg across iraq which would not have been possible without what you said happened, which is the iraqi military just melted away. and the iraq where military melted away largely bus of prime minister maliki's mismanagement of the military. he it incompetent shia officers in charge of the mail tear and in a short period of time destroyed what the united states created and trained in terms of the iraqi military. so that's what happened. that's where we are. isis is a very significant threat to the stability of the mideast. that's why we're doing what we're doing. they're a moderate terror threat to us today. al qaeda actually in yemen and another al qaeda group in syria and pakistan, still are a greater threat to us than isis but given enough time in iraq and syria, isis will pose the kind of threat that al qaeda polessed post-9/11. >> thank you, director. please give both gentlemen a round of applause. [applause] >> david, what's your most recent back become. >> guest: about detroit at its zenith in the early 1960 asks what and what detroit gave america, and you also see the shat doughs of it collapse in the 18 months i write about from october of 1962 to may of '64. >> host: what wasteries like in '63. >> guest: booming creatively and artistic include and automotively. so many large characters. henry ford ii the head of ford motor company walter right head of the uunited auto workers. reverend franklin leading civil rights rallies a great collection of characters and a vibrant city. >> host: one of the things in your book "opposite in a great city" you talk about that ills not well known is that detroit went full blast for the summer home. >> in yes in 1963 they were the u.s. nominee to get the summer olympics for 1968 and they thought they would get it. four times about that detroit had been the american nominee for the olympics. they had strong connections to the movement and went to germany thinking they would be the choice, and geeow politics got in the way with the soviet union and the third world votes. think about what detroit would have been like had they got the '68 olympics. the year before the riots in detroit disrupted the whole -- the city's whole progress what may have happened if the city leaders had been more sensitive to the problems that were bubbling up. if the olympics had been held in '6 the year of black power that. >> host: bass barry gory and henry toed ii aware of each other in 1963? >> guest: good question. they were completely different worlds but somehow the worlds of my book intersect. barry gordy work on the mercury assembly line. the president ford wouldn't have known him but they did connect in that way. now kind all the connections of the great leaders of detroit. barry gordy recorded the "i have a dream" speech and you find a lot of connections that you might not expect. >> host: you have worked for the "washington post" for years and years. you're known for being from wisconsin in your vince lombardi book. why are you writing about detroit? >> guest: i was born in detroit in 1948 in women's hospital. my first seven years of life were in detroit. my 'memories are there of younger ale. >> and hudson's department store, and what actually the first chrysler commercial from detroit with m & m's driving through the streets that sparked me up. i thought about the place from which i came and wanted to honor it, and that's how i ended up writing this book. >> host: david marrannist, once the a great city. booktive covered mr. maranisn detroit at the detroit historical society. you can watch the full program at booktv.org. there,. >> this new years weekend book booktv bringouts two days of knopp fiction books and authors saturday evening, karl rove former white house deputy chief of staff looks at william mckinley's 1896 campaign in his new book, "the triumph of william mckinley. "mr. rove discusses the political environment in 1896 including political gridlock and mckinley's expansion of the republican base. mr. rove is interviewed by richard brookhiser senior editor are in national magazine. >> the republican party was bet beaten in 18923 mckinley has been the governor of ohio and seen the country descend into a deep depression, and the run runs think the election of 1896 is going to be theirs but he ills not the favorite of the party bosses. >> directly following, join booktv as we taped a book party thrown for karl rove. sunday, author david maranis will be live with your e-mails calls and texts. hit books include "once the a great city: a detroit story" as well as" first his class" a biography of bill clinton. "tell newt to shut up." two days of nonfiction books and authors on c-span2. television for serious [applause] >> a review from the introduction and. friday december 10th, 2010 and will double up the usual time with my usual breakfast of mobile and coffee then hide in discussions with chinese staff. and then i began a speech it turned out to be a very long speech. it went on for eight and a half hours. i promised to do everything i could. that was the very bad tax agreement between obama and the republican and leadership. had the most uncommon distribution of wealth is seems to be totally absurd for millionaires end billionaires'. >> this was the lame-duck session so by confirming under a democratic house and had set those tablets for the trickle-down theory floorboard bad decisions. in large tax breaks for the rich is only one system touched that is grotesquely failing the african-american and. the party is increasingly and everything else is getting wider. why did it happen? advent heard a way that is not heard in washington. [inaudible conversations] i and here to introduce michael weiss that as a national best-seller attitude introduce him and questioned answered and our other guest was supposed to be here he is the author of black flag and was not able to, because of the death of the family. with michael has covered russia extensively in had is editor at tv be set and came down last february 8 it was a national best-seller. we will just go into my questions to you get it started. cad you tell us how you keep to write the book and and and why? >> i was covering the serious crisis since the inception long before there resent the presence in syria to be a college fox and i got to know a lot of the opposition with peaceful protesters stand activists and then i started to meet with refugees because turkey is a barracks for the rebellion. in this summer of 2012 i went with the free syrian army he convoy could those to be liberated from the assad regime to spend the night in a town one hour north in the order of was a syrian rubble and we spent the night there and he was extraordinary because i have seen firsthand. it is one thing to you turn on and cnn the you really have to see it for yourself to understand a the driving force behind the rebellion. because these bubbles put down there guns to pick up white gloves and garbage bags to pick up the rubble from the streets because the government was bombarding civilian infrastructure actually targeting the town so 81 injured could not be treated. it was extraordinary they turned the mosque into a makeshift hospital and were treating everybody. pro-government fighters and militiamen in equally with syrian rebels. i saw that with my own eyes. but fiver six months later when the town was completely taken over the house that i had stated was controlled by isis the family fled the country into turkey so i watched in realtime that started off as a noble and dignified rebellion and the like many revolutions had become that parallel image of what it rejected in and buy a co-author is a serious national coming from the town in the eastern province of syria. to put this in context it is a gateway to down between syria and iraq that had been a traffic .4 al qaeda and iraq for the group that is now known as isis. that has a relationship from juarez to el paso. so he comes from the syrian drive with an extended family network they know everybody in the region. so we're not going to write a book about isis you have to understand the nature of the enemy to defeat it. we have interviews with fighters at the lower ranking level but their family members. teesixteen year-old boy a studying chemical engineering wanting to live in the last cast his lot with barbarians. but is the driving mechanism? so the point is not to justify but to explain the rise of the terror army by last year's calculus now controls a swath of terrain roughly the size of great britain. i did a lot of media 2014 to inaugurate this operation resolvent i kept getting announced where do they come from? how did they emerged from nowhere? it sounds like the most absurd question and i have ever heard imagined in 1985 in southeast asia they just don't call themselves vietcong and they say where did they come from? isis was al qaeda 2004 through now they have been the primary enemy of the united states and its allies so they just change the printer name in the marketing and the strategy is a sophisticated manner. of lot of this is a work of history going back to these terrorist organizations in dade tragedian jailbird who went into iraq percy's spent time in iran then set up this organization but became one after attacks so we wanted to give the average reader so face it be all have targets on our backs. they would bomb the book festival there would fly planes into everything they could to try to believe and to alleviate the united states and every civilized country in the world. so it is of broad history but culminates with "in-depth" reporting for what they want. >> talk about the people who make up isis can you go into what you describe which is the social media and the internet campaign that draws so many recruits? keeping in mind i am trying to get at the question whether or not to the extent they can recruit fix is simply a fifth of the internet campaign or neglect is the actual message? >> everybody has read about the fourth fighter from on. that boy a in tunisia and kids in kentucky because they employ to join the army but the story of how with has done that the people who were joining are already in the trade data isis controls. they operate like an organization it doesn't work to let this helen's of terrorism but twentieth century ternate's installing is the of lands to understand them. it is not coincidence people in the upper echelon not the self-declared once but those behind him come from where? for relief from saddam hussein's. what does that mean? the iraqi government was trained by to? the soviet kgb and the east germans. my friend obtained documents the guy is dead but he got hit the documents from a former security official in the regime that had established the isis now working in syria in particular. and he said it was like reading what the style is used to do to the dissidents with counterintelligence by nonconformance and the important thing is we think isis is a military juggernaut you have seen those carriers stolen from iraq actually those that get themselves over to isis in defense of the invasion. what do i mean? they send a sleeper sell and the spies they gore around to say who controls the area? the free syrian army? they are corrupt they involve themselves with the rape and murder in judicial killings. we will make the trade run on time. pledge allegiance to as if not we will kill you because you are a traitor and an enemy so entire villages go over before they even get there this is how the takeover so much trade. with the social media yes they are very good using twitter and facebook and they have platforms that most people have not heard of. there is one that we document is an application on a mobile device to listen in realtime to with the clerics are propagating giving the friday sermon emperors' you can listen from your cellphone. but again the founder of what we now call isis, his network masterminded the use at one of what we call agitation and propaganda you all remember the american contractor in iraq? '' was the optics? they justin in the orange jumpsuit, denouncing him as the enemy of the crusader of the holy land and cut his head off on tv we did another term by roll back then but that video with viral in it is difficult to understand we watch these but to a lot of people they think this is just desserts america led a holy war style occupation and that is the propaganda so they came in to knock them down it is a political project they actually do have a policy with their thinking so they knock out saddam hussein so now ruling over the shiite majority if you were a sunii lived high of bob with your wife your mistress is injured 12 kids your palace illegal trade. when we went the dispirited the iraqi army, led the first three levels of the baath party were rendered not fit for public service so days to have lived in this economy were rendered unemployed but humiliated their sense of dignity and self-worth so the insurgency was not led by ford fighters against want to emphasize this. that is a problem but look at the native population first that is how isis rules. guys who were disenfranchised became the insurgents fighting the americans some new the iraq war and was cutting after afghanistan issuing an important statement to say for the first time ever that they should make common causes with the infidel been they had agents what no link the toppling of the regime would get justice or revenge of deaths are carli was a ford fighter but he had become intimidated of population. this is the most important thing to a understand they convert people they need us any arabs to fight and die on their behalf because they present themselves as the custodian of islam and that's project is that they want to reclaim that and the shia the you are better off to be a christian or a jew he was the genocidal maniac but he was outnumbered by numbers of magnitude. >> but then backed by everyone they will come after the sudanese to come after a san torture us to do the horrible things that we remember from the iraq war. that was his plan. isis had adopted that plan with that of the ground sociology. and he is in iraq to everyone. so it is cohesive for a unified state and it has evolved. now she is states and belongs to everyone. the city said wire redoing this? this is strategically stupid to do so they accidentally hit the country to iran. today they say they didn't accidentally do anything it is part of the conspiracy of the crusaders of the jews. the united states is in bed in serious that is why they did not intervene and they work with the iranians. look at this objectively how this plays out and that is what is taking place. but objectively but does this coalition? now russia and they are going against the extreme and most worrying even if you're not ideologically sympathetic you see that. it creates of love all of sympathy and political empathy for the project so understated in the way this part of the overall works and one of the tragedies of the last decade from stupid foreign policy is we learned a lot of this stuff. willard how to cultivate the sunii is now we have forgotten all that and isis has absorbed its mistakes and right now it is succeeding and we're losing a war because of that dichotomy in strategy. >> when you say we're losing the war talk about what it is we are doing and whether or not that is considered as progress and then a little about the current russian campaign militarily. >> i don't think the united states has developed a coherent strategy for defeating or containing of isis. we're doing what we did in the early days of the iraq war counterterrorism, very non credible been downright nasty war criminals to do the work for us. with iraq is the militia of groups that spent the better part of the decade going after american soldiers for profit if they count if they hit seven of jeff then they say they have been cleansed by the government so we're doing the same day and over again. you all remember the awakening? we ejected 35,000 troops the idea was to solidify political gains at the grass roots local level village by village. the awakening was tribes boarded over by al qaeda and iraq eventually seen as another form of foreign occupation they impinge on the economy's they would rape of women it rigo like the americans but a least they don't burn our houses to the ground so they partnered with us in a pragmatic fashion but the point to it didn't work politically united states disengaged maliki that was a puppet of iran and did the things that cannot be done to keep the most extremist outcome of the country or strategically defeated we allowed it to become another sectarian war so the united states is walking into another trap we are partnering with people that are seen as people who want to be our allies again desperately to see us no better than isis. and with respect to russia of the first article i said russia will intervene in syria and people looked at me and i said not only that but they will not go after isis their goal is no different to destroy any credible alternative especially those backed by united states that free syrian army the doesn't mean anything because you have hundreds of thousands of armed militia on the ground but there are those that have been partnering with and holding ground against the regime. if you look at the first three weeks of this intervention more than 90% have been targeting non isis targets. take your pick if you eliminate the free syrian army and forced them to join renovator terrorist organizations in syria they split from 2014 that is another story and then damascus comes to the united states to unleash chemical weapons to torture and rape but it is either us to those who fly the plane into your building so take a peck. >> state acquiesced to a the plan cooked up in the capitals of damascus and we do nothing about it. >> so what is it if you could advise the government what would you say? what should we be doing? >> i will explain the dynamics isis is taking territory because rush the bombs everybody but isis. so if your objective is to contain or destroy you cannot partner with russia or every and because that is not their objective. they have no desire to do that if you want to negotiate you need the opposition in the air during this tune some degree but there is a system to provide the rebels they are very effective they have turned the tanks into chunks of metal does this have been destroyed because we are allowing more into the country in response to the russian intervention but it is not enough right now the iranian ground soldiers have deployed backed by russian air power hitting targets the isis hits at the same time if you are a serious trouble and that is in any way interested in working with the west to challenge anyone to take up the gun and fight for a conventional military is all at once with success. the battle for isis must be focused in syria rather than iraq in terms of a symbolic defeat the end of days are coming in a town in a province exactly where this multinational war takes place is where isis wants to conquer because this will usher armageddon in day powerful narrative to sell in the serious if you don't want to engage them everyone wants to see them shoot down russian aircraft they also wonder world war iii and no problem in gauging the ground forces because the coalition from putin in the ayatollah and the supreme leader in the committee under of the revolutionary guard corps. but then they sell those to the iranian people that the russians have no problems dropping the bombs from the sky as they are led to death in a foreign country draw your people are starving and we have a toolkit to we're just not using any means at our disposal and here i am a little sympathetic to the administration briard tired we think get the hell out and even if you don't believe in interventionism that is fine but the problem with the idea is you may not be interested in the middle east but they're interested if you. because the current theory is if we step down we will create equilibrium because the regional actors will step up ivory and. soda arabia, the day back the rebels and includes al qaeda. this is not the equilibrium anyone wants to see emerge. so you start at a small level. >> guest: to beat isis then under still of that political strategy in we have failed. >> now live the life to turn it over to questions. [applause] >> if you have questions we have a microphone to be captured on television stick thank you for that eliminating presentation my question maybe stupid but is there a difference between the term isis and did isil and if not why does the administration continued to use the term isil? [applause] >> roughly speaking go. -- no. historically speaking guess the idea one encompasses more trade but the fact we have a debate of what to call the is the level of stupidity. [laughter] with the president of the disease say we must not call them the islamic states excuse me you called them the islamic state of the iraq and other jihadi said the middle east call them that. who cares? tell them. who cares? get a strategy in place. [laughter] [applause] what is the counter narrative? who cares? >> what is the long term effect of the mass exodus from syria on the basis and the europeans? >> the majority of refugees are fleeing the assad regime. the overwhelming majority were killed in buying the regime. deicide government blocks dole whole families bonfire they gain grape boys and girls of dissolve documented i bench in this for reasons because you have to understand where they drive the capital from. other refugees and betty is worried they will come over and a mass waves. the people that have come over in droves are the she demolition of the iranian-backed mercenaries fighting many of them were criminals but given amnesty social media is awash with blackbeard's and rifles stolen from the u.s. army or the iraqi security forces to stay and in front of a home the that belonged to us that gives the image of the same guy dressed like me standing in front of a mcdonald's those are the ones i am worried about i am sure there is always a margin for everything. yes we could wake up one day to save us the her came over as part of the refugee convoy but it is deleterious to politics in europe by lived in london looked at what is happening in hungary the up prime minister is riding that wave of populist enthusiasm to say they are invading the heartland of christian europe it will change the politics of the continent let's get hungry or nato those anti-muslim sentiment is on the rise there are terrorist attacks all the time. this is another reason why the middle east always comes home. >> could you comment on the information that is conveyed through the mitty media to the on going middle eastern crisis? >> a lot of it is hysterical there is cause for hysteria when it controls three capitals in the middle east you have a big problem. i agree and i try as best i can to give an accurate portrayal. i don't want anyone to go home to the bareheaded - - hiding under a bed. we have been very lucky. we have a very good law enforcement sector fbi, local police conduct, counterterrorism but who can statistics there was a piece since the taking of mosul last year there is an average of one event per month terror plot aborted sometimes it's like the keystone kops a 15 year-old experimenting. that could be dangerous but not 9/11 type caribe and times square. but one per month for the last year is a lot even more than post than 11 period because we are at the state to of crisis optics in europe is this the period we are living in? taking a beating with the credit crisis with these fringe parties isis it is part of this selling themselves to use the ideology and it is very powerful. i mentioned i tried to pepper this subject with illusions there is the great essay that says how is it the most civilized nation give themselves over that promised them slavery? so don't think it can't happen again or under the guise of religious fundamentalism saddam said i'd go return under the flag of islam after the first war to push the foreword he turned a lot of his agents that we now deal with today. it does not slowed down if it does not end i have a five month old daughter by the time she is ready for college we will still talk about isis but it may not be called isis that is just a fact. >> what do your best guess how it will play out? >> i honestly don't know. at this point a mild or moderate recommendations and to work better but i really don't know. you hear oral lot of cheerleading that is masqueraded i worked at the "daily beast" the pentagon and 50 different analyst have blown the whistle, the pentagon cooking's the intelligence presenting a rosy picture they said that we distrusted -- disrupted the network they don't even rely on oil anymore but they have makeshift refineries we did not know about their very adaptive and clever. we have to be honest about the threat we're facing if it goes against the tide doesn't matter you have to tell the truth if you don't understand your you have no business to try to fight it. >> i will make a statement first we went to war in iraq because of the world trade center. i think we never should have gone there. the robot might have been a better solution to what happened? >> cry of the house all the time would be have isis if we didn't go to iraq? >> we would not have the crisis but don't rule out of policy that the group could have been merged but to do as much damage. a historian is never on his honor paddling counterfactual history but if he still runs baghdad said of the st. louis the primary petrine in syria? said of the save the free syrian army would rely on a rack because even though a side hated each other for political reasons that go back centuries from damascus sore back dash door that dichotomy. so leaving him in power may not have been a pleasant states of affairs i mentioned earlier we take of his regime has secular but after 1991 he started the islamic canapes the attempt to bury the secular ideology because of his mind the greatest threat to his regime would come from within muslim brotherhood. so he tried to create a frankenstein monster that turned into our monster the insurgents treated after the invasion they had gone through the campaign they did not have to be taught it was already made they also have access to car smuggling rings the weapons weapons, underground real-estate havens in defense of impending catastrophe so is a dangerous game to play but we don't know. that is the honesty answer. >> you said the city are the faster geordie around the world? reseed turkey but then they bombed the. >> the turks have played a dangerous game i have reported from turkey and i crossed the border into syria. in indian foreign correspondent brent because he have brown skin and gave him a refugee card so doubt he is technically a serious refugee they have turned a blind eye because for them getting rid of a side was the primary objective actually was to prevent the kurtis stand there was always filtered through that presume so they have a good relationship with the iraqi kurds then to give them their own state in northern iraq but they don't want to use the the democratic union of kurdistan. they fight the most ferociously in northern syria backed by u.s. special forces on the ground directing these raids. but the party in northern syria is the syrian branch of the pkk we consider them to be a terrorist organization the turks consider them to be as bad as isis. the first largest army in nato is giving your support to a group that is the sister of a terrorist organization according to less than the second largest army which is turkey meat while they are bothering them at the same time to exclude that is how complicated and twisted this is. i don't tell anyone in this tent that ideology exported it is denatured and degenerated a campaign in the balkans we're still dealing with the demons of the al qaeda ideology essentially the gulf state countries were doing it is a myth when people say they get their money from the saudis. they don't have to buy 2,006 al qaeda and iraq had become so freddie chile self-sufficient by the oil wells in in the kidnapping and cuban trafficking and extortion so rich osama bin bond announced his own subsidiary for alone. the notes traffic these figures because nobody who's truly but they are making billions of dollars. every month the more trade they take a charge taxes this is why the one cities and towns and people if you have a village of every member has to pay taxes to isis that doesn't count what is skimmed off the top. we could say our allies and not doing enough they are dropping bombs there using the former spiritual mentors to do it to the only group that is not even directly talking to them why they make so much the european union governments pay them hundreds of millions in ransom money to get the angeles back they denied that they did that but everybody knows that they did in james believe family is hopping mad. >> the president recently decided to keep forces said afghanistan is isis interested in afghanistan? >> there already there. those extremist rise to the top in takeover because they have better discipline a coherent narrative they kill anyone who gets in their way. they don't care about being killed and they welcome that. they are in libya, yemen libya, yemen, they have a significant branch in egypt they look to open up shop around the world i don't want you to think they are toppling hold governments but they have a presence for sure and this is the reason we're not pulling out of afghanistan. [applause] this sunday night on cuba day. on his career in his recent book of political cartoons. >> i have this it's kind of a conglomeration of extremist israeli settlers and a palestinian figure who if you notice he's on a prayer rug but he has his shoes on. both these figures are sort of utilizing a false religion for political purposes. so just proves once again i am an equal opportunity offender. >> sunday night at eight eastern and pacific on c-span's q&a. >> thank you. i am fred lawson and it's my honor to introduce tonight's guest. abdel bari atwan is editor-in-chief of the news and commentary website which established in 2014. it was founding editor in chief of the london-based newspaper "al-quds al-arabi," and in 2012 middle east magazine named him one of the 50 most influential arab public intellectuals. he is author of two important books on militant islamic movement, the secret history of al-qaeda which he told me just now has been translated into 32 languages, and after bin laden, as well as the memoir a country of word. his new book "islamic state: the digital caliphate," has just been released in the united states by university of california press which originally published in london but don't tell the people over at berkeley that i said that. he joins us at the moment when the organization that calls itself the islamic state islamic state is on the mind of everyone who pays attention to world affairs and we are fortunate he is joining us this evening. we it's a pleasure to welcome you he to the world affairs council this eveningng. trying abdel bari. [inaudible] >> please excuse me. is your microphone on, sir? no. we can see you but we cannot hear you. . >> there is still no sound. is your microphone on? there is camera but no sound. is this on our and? yes. >> i am not good with the latest technology. but i talk about bad digital caliphate. [laughter] >> as i read your book you say they are in a political project from different of al qaeda or the affiliate's in syria. how would you describe the key difference between the islamic state in space the al qaeda? >> with al qaeda is seen as the of richer because it was fully dependent on the osama bin london. so it is the old vic in french of a camera and then all other mainstream organizations but when it comes to the islamic state no. it is a well established organization to be very efficient with three or four distinguished elements of the first is sufficient funds originally -- freddie originally intended is equal every day to the energy bill itself. between four and 7 billion. so not lake al qaeda was to rely on the nation's from certain arabs that the state is so sufficient military wise. what i say self-sufficient with those cities is in serious to put their hands with they defeated the iraqi army. and they left huge sophisticated arms behind them. but the heather that led differentiate themselves so before that with the sudanese government of to know they have their own sovereign state from their own territory to be very independent with troops on the ground and you could so on. so there is another one that is social media to reach all the corners of the world without any intervention so that is why it is very sophisticated. it is not dependent on 1 billion because osama bin lauded he wanted love to see himself on abc and cbs but he is not like that and they don't see him since. so that is what differentiates al qaeda. >> it seems to be remarkable whenever a commander of the islamic state is eliminated there is another to take the place there seems to be back up. >> yes. definitely. it is not a one-dimensional it is a collective leadership. actually he is not the man running the show. but to go back to the root of the is of state to see the republican guard are we in the security forces organization otherwise they could not run this stage of a 5 million population to have a cabinet is a police force so i don't believe that they are running the state to. so it goes perfectly well and to go down if you look at it it is more than the a their states around it. it is more secure more law and order compared to the iraqi states so that is why those that our ruddy dash show. >> that we ted to forget that at the very biggity the former officers of the iraqi army and the senior berbers were an important part of the islamic state preliminary organization into iraq. are idiom those people still around garner still former officers? >> yes. before we go into detail if you want to wonder stimulant the first key word they were humiliated by their country and also outside powers that is extremely important. so if we have 60 percent of our population under the age of 27 so you have millions of young people that is extremely important. then the problem is the al side road under estimates in day never pay attention to how it is going. so that is extremely important if we don't have good government in the middle east. with us a dictatorship with that democracy so it is extremely important in the foreign intervention between now and then. we have seen it in syria. that point in particular has those invaders from the outside because we knew was a stable country. but now it is divided so when you intervene by military means you have left a vacuum with those organizations like al qaeda och but the of last thing is extremely important they are controlled by the social media. and they play into the hands of us a terrorist organization and then they either merge. when america advocated the occupied arab. he just told the iraqi army. but then those were humiliated so this kind of frustration is as b.c. it now. >> one of the state is that you show in your book to be sophisticated for different territories. so the islamic state has appointed iraqis to be the governors of territories but as time goes by he fox from the organization with the syrian sandia iraqis on woodside. >> with the different nationalities. this and that islamic state if he can see that but the tunisian opposition a maker for example, have different groups to be that side of the organization of. this is the most dangerous. to execute people that is extremely important. added she was there so each group is different. to have some split in the organization and. and then been bonded try to keep them intact. so then i believe you try to keypads united. >> there was a remarkable treatise's in 2004 under the title of a mitt of savagery. and might possibly have to admit to abide the egyptian islamic. if every your sudbury the face of savagery seems to lie somewhere between from the territory to adjust is all the quarter. what the marxist used to call the proletariat. how is it every day brutality they prepare the ground? >> that is a very good question and. that is the ritual of the islamic state. when he wrote the manual only the bible of that movement he concentrated on the savagery. with the time to take over and what he means by that. had read we created this anarchy. and what is happening now? they use this for two reasons. and that is what happened. as a savage jury brutal organization in to using it as a means of recruitment the maximum followers to say we're very strong so we can terrorize those people so savagery is extremely important sending the of the into paris for that positive message so this is that message that we convey. also to destroy in an economy. to kill those people but now to see that income so they went to paris and friends so with that of meshed airplane? after the results for the middle east. but by coincidence now. they act very well. >> is of a hotly debated questions indebted states. is there anything important that is part of the ideology of this group? >> if you go to the literature you will find it is a revival but then that a -- 88 century so that is what the saudi government is because it became a burden upon the shoulder of that backward state and that savings legacy and that is why they're very attractive to deal people. but they are sympathetic. there are very attractive and to answer those people it has to be ideological. soda and of those because they know that. that is deeply rooted in in other parts in particular. so that ideology. >> as i was reading your book is seems to be influences of the of liberation and party that begins in palestine. and then to do this the ideology is peaceful. but you know, to have these ideologies of the islamic state. and that's is what they did. wednesday massacred thousands and in thousands of people there. but that is the ideology to terrorize people. >> to manage your book does show that connection between saudi arabia in the other militant islamist movement. part of this connection comes from the fact that they consider themselves to be the leader of all laws will dash muslims. so those said consider themselves to be leaders of the muslims. and to so to get himself that type of character. all over the world. so those people and what the people call them to take the american side ted has they wanted to ruby -- to the end also the muslim brotherhood like syria and iraq between the sunii and shia. nl on the other side. >> it is my a opinion that they were opposed but did they not see it that way? >> get used to be. with that purpose of turkey and saudi arabia. to adopt in now to present itself with that president caliphate recife ottoman empire. with those differences to be united now. to support that muslim brotherhood and between them and to egypt those that consider the muslim brotherhood of the region itself parker --. the data are welcomed by saudi arabia. >> exactly. picks that that was very shaky as they establish themselves strongly. and did the later stages to be very well organized. had decided to ignore them. they adopt them in iraq and syria. >> and though the audience is interested and posing a question as they prepare to come to a microphone. here barquette one plate it is engaged in a campaign of expansion is some. but one night argue they're trying to protect the muslim community from attack thick fog interference in hand what would you say about that? >> end yes they want to take revenge. ifs and by the way it was that resort of the caliphate they didn't choose mosul pecos of this so it is extremely important so first to conquer and expand on the surroundings but it seems there is a shift from pierides so this part of ideology is extremely important so in the biggity to say in the region. but then to let get other things but in parts of syria or iraq this so with that legacy. >> dash you know, president barack obama has come under a great deal of criticism that they were kids he did day year to be for the attack but i thought it had broadly bed contained just before the operation. >> because now but it is contained and recently in syria and with that peshmerga so the loss of seven jars but also so navy this is why they decided. >> if the fed is very thoughtful. >> questions from the audience i have announced to repeat the question. >> i want to ask him to focus on saudi arabia to last 55 years has ben a close ally of the united states. and they do not see of rent to many of the objectives and highlight his comments. >> thank you saudia arabia has had strong connections it doesn't look like much of a friend of the united states at the moment doesn't look like it is still a partner to you? >> but to be fair that that strategy is setting arabia by a strong doctrine so those that try to defeat him. with the americans do destroy iraq and the same fate. they do not forget and they use them. so there is a change so i believe obama was aware of this. but you have to actually adopt the people. who are frustrated so it is like a tide in the future. to a the boots on the ground. and look what happened to was. >> there are reports that there is a senior rivalry for the next key deal have been cited for ration of the struggle? >> yes. pie her he has some sort of damage show or alzheimer's. and did he told me this a couple years ago. bets that and i add my reality that the tests of that illness his family is taking over. bid and could leave some sort of legacy it is part of a resentment. had the people who are scared of the future. >> second question. >> thank you very much for your comments of the al qaeda of day quite to well organized isis. and to understand them very well. if we compare world war i and end of world war ii. so did the emperor of japan and they're very well organized but we beat them. thought so every organization in hasn't weaknesses how can we ea there have been powerful adversaries of the united states in the past like japan and germany in the 1940s very well organized, very strong administration but those entities were defeated. so every organization has a weakness. every organization has some vulnerability. do you see any important vulnerability in the islamic state? >> yes definitely. i can see this vulnerability. if you look at the enemies of the islamic state you'll find more than 100 countries would like to root it out completely. they understand the danger and you have the contradiction. you cannot for the first time since the second world war we have the americans and russians working together to defeat the islamic state. unprecedented for the last 80 years or so. also we have the enemies in the middle east are working together to root out islamic state like iran and saudi arabia. never happen. so you can see the our enemies launching a war against yemen and syria but when it comes to the united states to realize that it is a danger for both of them and they're working together now to defeat the islamic state. it is a defeatable. i cannot say it is not debatable, but the problem is what will happen after you defeat them? the problem is if you look at the west okay they defeated gadhafi, saddam hussein. they have blamed a but they never have plan b. that's why middle east actually -- okay we want to bash his head, remove him from power whoever he is. islamic state hussein, gadhafi, but when it comes to the morning after this is the biggest question. that's what happened in afghanistan. they removed the communist will but they never had a plan of how to rule afghanistan. they invaded afghanistan to occupy it but you never created stable afghanistan. the same thing in iraq. they managed to defeat saddam hussein. but what happened after that? victory can be cheaper we have to have plan after victory. do we have any plan will happen to the middle east after we defeat them if we defeat the islamic state court nobody can tell us about the future of syria. no one can tell us the future of iraq. i can we create -- this is the most important. >> you mentioned some external vulnerabilities of islamic state. the question i think was about internal vulnerabilities. do you see anything inside the administration might weaken the organization? >> yes. external and internal are actually, we cannot separate the intro from the extra. that's the important thing. usually the internal portal building is defeated by outside and in the region itself or the muscle power. this is the most important. it is vulnerable inside. vulnerable because smh in a lack of good governance. the people are not involved, they are not determining their future. this is a problem. you have autocratic regime running the whole country and depriving its people of having a say on the future come on the present. this is the most important thing. now they're trying to cover their vulnerability by intervening and syria intervening in human come into being and to cover their shortcomings inside saudi arabia itself. this is the most important thing. yes we can defeat the islamist state. it is defeatable but the problem is we have to have a good example a model for the people of the islamic state the people of the middle east. as i mentioned it is the most secure state and the whole of the middle east. the problem is look at the middle east know people are emigrating from syria, from iraq, from yemen to the was. but when it comes to the islamic state people are immigrating from the west to the islamic state or so people it's counter immigration. we have to set up a good example an alternative model to the people of the middle east to say look forget about the islamic state. we have the model for you model of coexistence, model actual modernity, model of prosperity. model of human rights independent judicial we have to actually say look we are working for a long-term future. not short-term future. when a good repeat our mistakes in afghanistan, in iraq and libya, no. we have out a plan and we have our be plan and this is our be plan. until now, we never had anything like this. distraction not contraction. that's what i see. >> you see any sign that western governments have those sorts of plans for the post-islamic state in syria? >> to be honest i can't see it. i remember i was invited by the foreign office to talk to the interior minister before they need to intervene in libya bombarding libya. and i said to him look listen i know you're preparing for some sort of intervention military intervention, you have to be very careful because libya will be -- al-qaeda will be there. there are about -- this will be a supreme court for immigration and i wouldn't be surprised if terrorists actually smuggled, mingled among those to your. you have to be very careful. he did not like what i am saying. seriously. the meeting ended in six minutes. honestly. my coffee was still warm last [laughter] there are so-called think tanks and press settings that people are talking about the middle east and distance. they don't know the feeling they are but look what happened in libya. we removed gadhafi. he was a good dictator. no question about that but what happened to libya after that? have we established good governance of there? of the established a strong security forces? made it is the most sophisticated clients in the world. it has about 28 countries, modern countries, why did this to actually establish institutions to libya after gadhafi? why did they not exactly, keep those same institutions that tried reform and develop them? the same thing in iraq. united states is the most advanced country in the world. the biggest empire, the strokes empire in our history. they invaded iraq. why introduce secularism to arrive? you are a multicultural country. you set up a good example and establishing a equality. the most important thing how to build the country, how to make people coexist with each other. we did not apply the same principles to iraq and that's why we are facing a problem in iraq and in syria in the whole region. >> yes another question. >> my question was does he have any for the comments to make about the role of iraq? but just to follow up on what he was saying some say that the middle east is not ready for democracy. we can't import it. would he comment on that? >> thank you. so when we think about the future of the region after the islamic state, scholars disagree about whether liberal democracy is possible in this part of the world. do you think liberal democracy with constitutions and elections and freedom of the press is possible in the arab countries? >> it is impossible but the problem is we don't have the culture of liberalism. we don't have a culture of democracy in our part of the world. it is not a button on and off. you cannot actually import democracy and say to the middle east and people you have to a doctor. the problem is where to protect the ground for democracy and for liberalism. unfortunately the west never did. after their supporting autocratic regimes for the last 60 or 70 years in the middle east under the name of stability. we should encourage liberalism. we should encourage coexistence. i would like to draw the audience distinguished audience, attention to what would. have you noticed that most of the countries in the middle east which is facing instability now our secular countries? if one of the people coexist with muslim, sunni and shia the arabs and the kurds, this is the irony. nobody looks at that. ..q or libya to be judged yet big. with that coexistence. and with that era sprague. and how they start to think for those that coexisted. but the society used to live together. we need to split coexistence. the problem of marginal as asian is actually get the central element that emerges of the islamic state. the sunnis are marginalized in iraq because of the american occupation. others are working with the american administration. those people have a theory we should consolidate the majority with the shi'ite rule and marginalize this ines under the law precept of saddam hussein absolutely wrong. we have to look at that, why we destroyed the process of coexistence for the middle east and iraq ceo, libya, lebanon, this is the problem. >> there was a moment of liberal democracy across the arab world but elections in egypt and iraq and syria but during that liberal moment parties were tied to outside powers and had a bad reputation to a liberal institutions. >> absolutely correct. la imperialists power in that time, looking at a solution, they introduce liberalism and introduce democracy and by civil means, not delivery means the people that are out to be liberal, communicate and coexist and go through a political process where the box will determine, unfortunately the new imperialism in the middle east not repeating that. this is a narrative here. why for example americans try for democracy, not working properly. why does it not work in iraq. why in libya. this is the problem. when i say, we should educate people, we should look for a long-term strategy, not just short-term. we are going to remove and then, no. we have to have a parallel plan, parallel strategy, to make people love foreign intervention. they would love it. if you opened the gates to immigration in the united states tomorrow you will have 300 arabs knocking on your doors because they believe america is out with the example for coexistence. this is why we don't actually do that to the middle east in an amicable way not by force. >> we can have too more questions if we are lucky. >> my question is is they're going to be a plan b if we defeat the islamic state? don't you think plan b has to come from the islamic world rather than -- do you see any signs of that happening? >> thank you. if there is a plan b for c via lebron or yemen might that plan b come from the arab world or another part of the world than the united states and europe? >> it used true. we have to convince the arab rulers especially in the gulf region, saudi arabia you cannot continue living like that. you cannot accumulate hundreds of billions of dollars, you have to actually put this money in the neighborhood. yemen cannot be the poorest country in the world and at the same time you cannot have that. you cannot have prosperity in dubai, why people are out in yemen, in egypt. this is wrong. the combination with the regional power to work together. look what is happening and some sort of coexistence, economic plan to create prosperity, they have forgotten about the war between brooke stone and the catholics. we need this in the middle east. and good government. if they are frustrated, marginalized, and this will -- they have a lot of money there. it should be spent by a wise guy on the region to make it much bigger and in this case a much better -- plan b 2 dino the middle east and encourage the coexistence and liberalism in that part of the world. >> next question. >> years ago obama declined to intervene, the world was presented with evidence of chemical attacks by bashar al-assad and the islamic state was born almost overnight. the impression still is that the islamic state is a bunch of militarized men that fund their territories. deegan vladimir putin said in a recent address to the general assembly, mercenaries and he knows the price of its. you are presenting us with a different view of what is happening. this is an organized government with a health care system. can you give better information than we are receiving on how is evolving out there. in addition to your book. our children going to school, we hear -- what is society light? how will that change over the coming year? >> in the western media we see pictures of the executions and brutality and chaos that might be present in the islamic state. can you say a bit more about the day to day administration, the way health and education and public services are being done today. >> a year ago iron was lecturing, giving a talk and while i was talking there was a ceremony. a smart man came to meet and they were not wearing the veil which he said to me i arrive three days ago, a year ago. from the islamic state. he said yes. i said you look very western. how do you see the situation? the most secure parts of iraq. imposing islamic codes on women and girls, he said people in the middle east and iraq in particular looking for security, looking for law and order. there were several malaysian there. polarizing let people, imposing taxes on them. now you have one government to be with and walter is there, police is there, traffic is there and the needs of the people it is brutal, savage if you don't provoke them, if you don't upset their loans, the mission here, many people think those people were here, and can manage one thing, to burn them to death. this is a very wrong concept here. they have high be aged jaded people, they are actually, they were educated, and the universities in the west. the dictator was very brutal. the country used to be run. it was under siege for 50 or 12 years but at the end of the agreement everybody -- medicine and food and equal terms without any differentiation. and taxes are collected, okay, they don't want a christian to be there, the problem is the majority of of people try to live under this, it is brutal, would not live one day under the islamic state. i know i can see the difference, the democracy, and that part of the world in comparison with the surroundings it is not bad. >> host: i saw a remarkable picture a couple days ago about a city worker fixing the water main. and the water department. it is almost time to wake up in london. spending much time with us. [applause] >> guest: i wish i am with you in person. i was looking forward to coming to you. and unfortunately, and deprived me from being among you. >> host: we look forward to hosting you. a few months from now. very good. abdel bari atwan's latest book "islamic state: the digital caliphate" is available in the lobby. thank you very much. >> booktv brings two days of nonfiction books and others. at 10:00 p.m. eastern on afterwards karl rove former white house deputy chief of staff looks at william mckinley's 1896 campaign in his new book the triumph of william mckinley, why the election of 1896 delmack is, karl rove discusses the political environment the 1996 including political gridlock and mckinley's expansion of the republican base. karl rove is interviewed by the senior editor of "national review" magazine. >> the republican party has been beaten in the 1890's to reelection. grover cleveland came into office mckinley has been the governor of ohio and seen the country descend to a deep depression and the republicans think the election of 1896 is going to be there's any wants to be the nominee but is not the front runner, not the favorite of the party. >> host: following after word that 11:00 p.m. eastern join booktv has we attend a book party for karl rove. sunday on in depth, david maraniss will be alive with your calls, e-mails and texts, is books include his most recent release, once in a great city, a they troy story as well as first of his class biography of bill clinton. tell newt to shut up and barack obama the story. booktv this new year's weekend, two days of nonfiction books and authors are c-span2, a television for serious readers. >> here is a look at some others recently featured on booktv ads afterwards, our weekly interview program. >> it is all about when your life hangs in the balance when you have a terminal illness is about giving me you the right to try to fight to save your life by accessing experiment elena investigational medicines while they're under study before they received the fda's final

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