Soviet space is russias highest foreignpolicy goal. Western sanctions as well as Energy Problems have tipped russias economy toward recession. Chinas leaders are primarily concerned with the mastic issues. The communist partys hold on power, stability, and economic growth. Even though it is looking for stable ties with the United States, it is more likely to accept tensions in pursuit of its interest. Especially maritime issues. China is expanding and accelerating the buildup of its outposts in the South China Sea to include stationing for their ships and potential airfields. More broadly, to continue an aggressive military Modernization Program directly aimed at what they consider to be our strengths. Their military Training Program last year included exercises unprecedented in scope scale and complexity to test modernization process modernization progress. They are pursuing an ambitious reform agenda. The slowdown of the chinese economy is reinforcing a harsh crackdown on internal dissent. Needless to say, there are many more threats to u. S. Interests worldwide that we can address. Such as afghanistan, north korea, and weapons of mass destruction. I think with that, i will stop and will open to your question. Mr. Chairman, in the interest of time, we have a statement for the record. Thank you. Director clapper, on the issue of defensive weaponry to ukraine. Do you think that if we give that assistance it will provoke putin to escalate his assistance to the separatists in their aggression against ukraine . Predicting what putin will do or what his behavior will be is something of an unknown. I think the Intelligence Communitys view is that if we were to provide legal assistance, this would evoke a negative reaction from the russians. It could potentially further remove the fig leaf of their position and could lead to accelerating or promoting more weaponry and higher sophistication into the separatist areas. I hasten to add that this is an Intelligence Community assessment and it is not necessarily to suggest opposition to provision of legal aid. My next question is, what more do you think that putin could do . Go to kiev . Certainly the weaponry he is using now is his most sophisticated weaponry. He could bring in a lot more if you wanted to. More volume. To do what . For example, armed helicopters. To achieve what goal . It is not our assessment that he is spent on capturing all of ukraine. He is bent on capturing all of ukraine. He wants an entity composed of the two old lost of the 2 oblasts in Eastern Ukraine. We do not believe that an attack on marion pull on mariopol is imminent. Well, i have to tell you that i disagree with you. They are already increasing activities around mariopol. I would predict he will put more pressure on their as he wants to establish a land bridge. Just as some of us have predicted had predicted what he is doing now. He is not going to go to kiev, he will establish a land bridge to crimea and decide whether to go to moldova or not. He is artie putting intense pressure on the baltics. He is already putting intense pressure on the baltics. He has done everything he wanted to do. You tell me what he wanted to do that he wouldnt have done if we had provided these people with the ability to defend themselves. Clapper i dont think that he will view it happily if the United States provides legal support. Mccain because more russians might be killed who are now in crimea killing ukrainians. Clapper thats right. It will be harder for him to hide that fact. Mccain Everybody Knows what he has done. I am not in open dispute with you. We have to move on. But it is just incredible to believe that he would be provoked to further action when he has achieved every goal that he saw along the way that he sought along the way. Clapper i think that they will wait until the spring before they attack mariopol. Mccain he is not getting any increase in sanctions. The ukrainians arent receiving defensive weapons. He has plenty of time. Yesterday, the secretary of state said that our world today is despite isil and the horrific killings, we are actually living in a. With less daily threat to americans and people in the world living in a period with less daily threat to americans and people in the world. And yet, just today the director of the fbi and others said that there are threats to 30 states in this nation. What is your view of the threat to the United States america . Clapper this will be the fifth year in my 50 years of the intelligence business that i have never seen as many threats around the world. I am worried about the safety and security of this country for many reasons. Not the least of which is the impact that sequestration is having on the Intelligence Community. We didnt get a pass. The same rules that apply to the department of defense apply to us as well. The common nation of the challenges around the world and the declining Resource Base that we have to monitor them is of concern to me. Director komi was referring to the fact that he now has some form of investigation. The fbi has a tiered system based on the intensity of investigation. Homegrown extremists, not the surly sympathizers of a specific group, are in all 50 states. Mccain sequestration, as it is planned, will damage our ability to protect this nation . Clapper it is a little bit harder for intelligence to make that case as opposed to the navy or the aircraft. Or the air force. In our case, it is more insidious, in that predicting when lesser ability will create a failure is harder to quantify. But based on my judgment, i am very concerned. And if we revert to sequestration in 2016, the damage to the Intelligence Community will be quite profound. Mccain thank you director. The chairman has covered very well some of the issues in ukraine and crimea. Is your assessment that putin is carrying out a Strategic Plan, or is some of this opportunistic . Or is it a combination of both . Clapper i think it became a Strategic Plan when yanukovych left almost a year ago. I think he saw an opportunity particularly with the seizure of crimea. Given putins approach and the way he looks at the way the soviet union was. His highest foreignpolicy objective is controlling the soviet the former soviet space. I think on the heels of the seizure of crimea and the establishment of some sort of arrangement in Eastern Ukraine and what i believe will be a softer approach maybe not direct military action but, as the chairman alluded to, moldova and pressure in the baltics particularly where there are high levels of russian minorities. It is a different situation with the baltics as they are nato members which moldova and ukraine are not. We have conducted recently some very small military demonstrations in the baltics. What hundred 73 173rd airborne went in. What is the russian reaction to those . Clapper i think they watched that. It is symbolically important. They are mindful of the fact that the baltic met the baltic nations are nato members. We have elaborate sanctions in place. You indicated in your comments that they have not affected his strategy. Clapper that is exactly right. So far it they have not changed his approach. Reed do you have any indication that as this situation to cherry rates further, there will be an impact on his strategy as this situation deteriorates further, there will be an impact on his strategy . Director clapper they are very sensitive about a revolution occurring in russia itself. That is another reason why putin reacted to the situation in ukraine, because he believed we instigated that as another color revolution. Ukraine is right on his doorstep and that, in turn, posed an accidental threat annex a stencil threat to russia an existential threat to russia. Senator reed in the next few days or weeks, there are two possible triggering events. One would be more aggressive action against assad regime in syria. Another would be the resolution of a deal on the ukrainian on the Iranian Nuclear program. Iranian forces are now director clapper is your question that is there a connection between the nuclear senator reed the conclusion of the negotiations. Director clapper i dont think the negotiations will have much bearing on what they do in iraq or any place they are trying to exert their influence, meeting syria or yemen. As best we can tell, the radiance the iranians have segmented the Nuclear Agreement from their regional aspirations. I have three questions. Director clapper, i know what your answer is after hearing your opening statement. But when you said that you havent experienced a time when we were facing more crises around the globe, do you still stand by that . Director clapper yes sir. Senator inhofe mr. Stewart, you say that we face more diverse and complex problems then we have faced in our lifetimes. Do you still stand by that . Stewart yes sir. Senator inhofe there is a sense that us on the committee do not know a lot of answers that we should know. When we talk about the power in terms of the strength and numbers in isis, it has been an additional 20,000 since this started. In august, they talked about from 80 to 100,000. In november, one of the kurdish leaders claimed the isis military grew to 200,000 fighters. Can you give us an idea . Director clapper for my view, it is unfortunate that these numbers get out. We dont have Census Bureau door to door accuracy over these numbers. They are very hard to come by. We have to derive them inferentially from a number of sources. When we do cannot out with numbers, you will have a wide range when we do come out with numbers, you will have a wide range. The current estimate is between 20 and 30,000. The difficulty is assessing who is a core fighter and does this fulltime versus parttime. One effect of the airstrikes has been substantial attrition. They lost 3000 fighters in kobani. What that is driving them to now, is that we are seeing evidence of conscription. The estimate we are seeing now is 20,00032,000. Senator inhofe i was over in ukraine when they had their elections. They were related. They were from very different parties but both prowestern. They were rejoicing that for the first time in 96 years, the communists dont have one seat in parliament. After that, i thought that we didnt have any problem of going in with weapons. We have language in our last Defense Authorization bill that we have 75 million that we were encouraging the president to use for weapons going into to assist our best friend in that area. I cant figure out why we dont do it. Would you recommend it . Director clapper i think i have to answer two ways here. This is a policy issue. Senator inhofe im not talking about troops, but lethal weapon. Director clapper from indigent from an intelligence perspective, that is a policy issue. I have a personal view, and it is only that. I would favorite, i would favor it, but that is a personal perspective. General stewart i am trying to stay out of the personal. We stand by the assessment that lethal aid could be delivered quickly enough or change the military balance on the ground. It would not change the military balance of power and it couldnt get there quickly enough to make a difference. Senator inhofe as a military guy, do you buy this argument that we may be provoking retaliation from putin. I see what the president is doing every once in a while, and they say that we dont want to make the terrorists mad at us. What is your opinion about this statement on provoking a negative reaction to reaction from putin . General stewart i think it is important enough to moscow that they will up the ante if we take any action. The realities are, they see this as central to their foreignpolicy. They see it as critical to keep ukraine out of nato and out of the western sphere of influence. Senator mccain im sure that hitler felt the same way that Vladimir Putin does. They say we cant get lethal weapons there quickly enough . That defies logic. We can put them on aircraft and fly them over there. How do you justify a Statement Like that . General stewart the statement was we couldnt deliver the aid quickly enough to change the military balance of power on the ground. Senator mccain quickly enough . What does that mean . General stewart russia and the separatists have lines that they can resupplied much faster than we can deliver, so it would be a race to see who can arm. And with their lines, they would have a significant advantage on the ground. Senator mccain im sure they had a significant advantage when they invaded afghanistan. Very disappointing general. Senator sheehan i want to go back to the middle east and to what is happening in syria. To what extent has excised has aside continued control over syria has assad continued to have control over the country. What is the thinking about how to change the dynamic . Director clapper he maintains the control because of his control over the economic levers to the extent that they have them. His focus is on the area from aleppo to damascus. That is where most of the population is and the major commercial entities. He is surrounded by people that are committed to preserving that because they benefit from it. They are the minority. The aloe lights are only the alawites are only 10 . The reality is thata assad is fighting isil as we are. It is a complex array of factors. Senator sheehan to what extent has that affected other arab countries in the middle east and their willingness to engage . Director clapper it has been somewhat of a change. It is gradual, but the fact that many of these countries are participating in the coalition. I do think the brutal savagery of isil with the beheadings and the immolation of the pilot have had a galvanizing effect on opinion in the middle east region. I think there is more of a willingness to cooperate. Certainly from the standpoint of intelligence sharing. Senator sheehan are you optimistic that turkey will become more engaged . Director clapper no. I think turkey has other priorities and interests. They are more focused on what they consider to be a threat with the kurdish resistance in turkey. Public opinion polls show in turkey that they dont see isil as a primary threat. The consequence of that is a permissive environment because of their laws and the ability of people to travel through turkey en route to syria. Somewhere around 60 of those fighters get syria through turkey. Senator sheehan to a rack to iraq. What is a rants presence in iraq is irans presence in iraq . Director clapper the iranians are there and helping with the fight against isil. There is still great reluctance to fully include the sunnis which must happen. There are laws that are extremely important to sunnis. Senator sheehan what i am trying to ask you to respond to is, to what extent is iran weighing their efforts to take on isil versus the sunnis role in iraq. Director clapper the fundamental interest of the iranians is to preserve a shia or shiafriendly government in baghdad. Isil poses a threat to the iranians as well, so they have an interest there in sustaining their aggressive combat and assistance. And opposing isil. Thank you gentlemen for appearing before us today. I would like to go into discussion with iran a little bit more. The Iranian Military is arguably one of the most deployed forces in the middle east. They have been into areas such as syria iraq, lebanon bahrain, yemen. Iran is effectively increasing its beer of influence in the region and it is also defending its allies in ways which afford iran the ability to alter battlefield momentum. We have seen a progression of expert witnesses in front of this very panel, and many of my colleagues and these witnesses have stated that they do believe that the president is failing in this area of setting a national strategy. His failure to construct a comprehensive strategy against iran has led to irans expanded influence in the middle east. I would like to hear your assessment, director clapper, on the tools that iran has and whether we are effectively engaging them, what we need to do to gain a National Security strategy. Director clapper i can comment on the intelligence aspects of this. National Security Strategy is not my department. The way that iran is exerting its influence in the region is through their Organization Called the iranian Republican Guard corps quds force. It is a commendation of intelligence and special ops. A combination of intelligence and special ops. They use that to expand their influence. Another one of their proxies is hezbollah which they have been a long client hypes up clientsubordinate relationship with. Certainly from an intelligence perspective, we try hard to keep tabs on those entities. Senator ernst is there a way that we can more effectively engage our neighbors in the middle east to push back on irans influence . Director clapper from an intelligence perspective, we do engage with our intelligence counterparts in all these countries those that are willing to engage with us. Particularly the sony particularly the sunni countries, which do harbor reservations about iranian objectives. Thank you both for being here. In regards to iraq, what do you think are the Biggest Challenges that the iraqi forces face right now in pushing isis back from ozone from mosul and tikrit. Director clapper obviously, the Iraqis Security forces, particularly the army, need to reconstitute after losses in Northern Iraq last june where about 4. 5 divisions of iraqi forces just melted away. That includes training and hopefully building the will to fight. They have some challenges with command and control as well as leadership and logistics. They have a whole range of issues that need to be attended to before they are in a position to unilaterally retake places like moz oh like mosul. General stuart last fall, they had they are holding three additional divisions they are Building Three additional divisions from the ground up. When are they ready . General stwewart we are talking probably 69 months. Se