Good afternoon, everybody. Welcome to the Washington Institute for near east policy. I have the pleasure of directing the institutes rinehart pergamon counterterrorism intelligence and i am very pleased to be joined here today by the acting director of the National Counterterrorism center, russell travis. Todays conversation is part of the ongoing counterterrorism lecture series. Russell took office as the acting director in august but its not his first, second or third time in the building. He told many other leadership positions in ctc including a director at the office of Data Strategy and innovation, chief data officer among others. Hes held positions at the office for Defense Intelligence agencies, National Security council, the u. S. Army, joint chiefs of staff so we are very thrilled that he has been able to carve time out of his busy schedule and spend some time with us today to talk about counterterrorism in the era of competing priorities. One russell will deliver some remark