When they do that it alienates potentially the Central Government in baghdad but to me the important aspect here and the important theme would be to sustain the pressure. One of the sources that has been surprisingly consequential is blackmarket antiquities sales for the looting. It is my understanding that the u. S. Has sanctions it can impose on anyone who imports antiquities stolen by isis but it doesnt have separate abilities to sanction individuals who purchase looted syrian antiquities. Would it be helpful to authorize sanctions that are not just against the buyer or the seller but against the middle man who are involved . I would take that under an fis and and consult with my colleagues in the department of treasury but i would tell you in the relative scheme of things the sale of antiquities is not a big revenue generator, it taper off some. Whatever way we can pressure the isil financially we should. I want to thank you for your service, and thank you for your many decades of service to our country, we appreciate it. I want to follow up on your written statement where you reiterated it today, iran reviews it as a way to preserve its Nuclear Capabilities and in the second option to expand its nuclear infrastructure, can you expand on that . The period of the agreement plays out, i think the iraqis will push the margins, they have done work on research and development on centrifuge designed. They sustained the position they have taken, the supreme leader, they are not going to pursue Nuclear Weapons but there are many other things they could do in a Nuclear Context that serve to enhance their technology and expertise. Let me ask you, we saw deer ran have Ballistic Missile tests on october 10th and november 21st, even pre receiving the sanctions cash release, they recently received of billions of dollars. We also know recently north korea had a space launch continuing to develop their icbm program. I wanted to ask you first of all, we know in your statement you mentioned historically there has been cooperation between north korea and iran under Ballistic Missile program, can you tell us what that cooperation has been and can we expect that north korea will sell or Share Technology with tehran that the expedite irans development of icbm missiles . I have to be mindful of the setting here, there has not been a great deal of interchange between iraq and iran, between north korea and iran on the subject of Nuclear Missile capabilities that there has been in the past. We have been reasonably successful in detecting this so hopefully upper. Vigilance we will sustain that. North koreans are interested in cash and this is one of there we know iran has more cash. They do now but as general stuart indicated a lot of their cash, at least initially was in cumbered. Iranians have a lot of obligations to fulfil the economically. Let me follow up. What do you make of the fact that the iranians did in fact, in violation of existing u. N. Resolutions made two launches of Ballistic Missiles and i think you were asked about the sanctions that were put in place, lets test the clear, those sanctions were not very tough, do you think those are going to deter iran from continuing to develop its icbm program . The iranians have conducted 140 launches since the original u. N. Security Council Resolution in 1929, it was imposed in 2010. Sows 70 of those, half of them were done during the negotiations given the fact that the missiles were not a part of a negotiation. As far as these two lunches are concerned, this was a deliberate message of defiance, the iranians will continue with an Aggressive Program to develop their missile course. You and i have talked in the past to be clear, we judge that tehran would choose Ballistic Missiles as his preferred method of delivering Nuclear Weapons if it builds from. That is obviously why you would build a Ballistic Missile if you choose to build a nuclear weapon. Have hundreds that threatened the middle east, two under development that could potentially given the technology, the immediate one that is the most of proximate that would be launched, built by civilians and ostensibly for space launch. I only have five seconds left but i want to follow up with a question. I believe you said apps and sentinel which of course is 30 to 50 times more powerful is coming over our southern border and that has doubled by the Mexican Drug Cartel going back to 2010. Do you believe that is something general kelly has raised this as commander of south calm. Said Delivery System and those cartels could actually deliver almost anything with sophisticated networks that have established but the you believe we should be focused on more interdiction particularly on the apps problem . I do. The experience of what i have observed, kelly said this consistently when he testified, it wasnt for lack of intelligence, it was lack of operational capacity to react and interdict. I am a big fan of the coast guard. The coast guard has done great things, and the new National Security cutters are fantastic capability for drug interdiction purposes. Thank you. Thanks to the witnesses. I have many questions to ask but also will focus on one. I am struggling with this and would love to hear your thoughts about low oil prices and how they affect our security posture. This is not in a litany of gloom. This is a good thing that has some elements that are challenging. I was in israel in april 2010 meeting with president shimon peres and asked him what would be the most important thing the u. S. Could do to enhance security in the region and he said wean yourself off of dependence on oil from the middle east and as i talked to him his basic logic was to the extent we develop non carbon alternatives for or our own native energy sources, our demand for middle eastern oil would drop, that would have the effect of reducing prices and a lot of the nations elise, iran and other nations, russia or venezuela, they used High Oil Prices to finance bellicose adventures in and if they get more stress on the cash time that had a hard time doing it so we have seen a Dramatic Development in american native energy and non carbon energy, and we have seen oil prices go to dramatic lows and the wont stayed there forever, but many are predicting they will stay significantly lower than historic lows. Is good for american consumers, good for american businesses, poses a challenges for our principal adversaries, russia for example, puts a cap to some degree on what iran would get from being back in the Global Economy selling the oil but it also poses some risks as well. I have heard european counterparts theyre really worried about aggressive russia but even more worried about economic basket case russia. From the intel side as you look at intel and threats, talk a little bit about the prospect all of Lower Oil Prices and danny negatives associated with that. You have painted the picture pretty well. It is working, i guess you could say, to our advantage, spoke about that earlier, the price of crude is 20 a barrel. When russias planning factor for the National Budget is 50 a barrel. This is effective for example, they have been unable to invest in the arctic, so it has profound impact and will for some time, structurally in russia. Venezuela is another case. The country that was completely dependent almost for its revenue for a long time on oil revenue, with a precipitous drop in oil, had a drop on the economy which is that is managed anyway and is laced with all kinds of subsidies for its people there people are facing insolvency so it has that effect and to the extent that we become independent and not depending on any ones oil, that is a good thing. Countries caught in the middle, i think, will be a mixed bag as to how well they manage themselves, and they are dependent on the price of oil. If is height either by virtue of Natural Forces or artificially, that could have a deleterious impact on the economy in europe so it is a mixed picture. A followup about russia in particular. It seems that sometimes they are more likely to engage in some adventurism outside their country when their internal politics and economy is in trouble. When things go bad at home, he wants to divert attention and whether it is throwing an olympics or world cup or invading another country that seems to be a move that he will make when he has dissatisfaction at home driven by economic challenges a there is some degree to which Lower Oil Prices negative affects an adversary that may make more unpredictable. That is true. All decisionmaking in russia is essentially done by one person. The russians have great capacity for in during pain and suffering. Polls that are taken in russia still indicate high levels of popularity of 80 range for Vladimir Putin. Is interesting, speeches of late, domestically have taken a different turn or different tone in that they are much more exhorting patriotic spirit and the great history of russia come as i think probably a way of diverting attention from the poor Economic Performance of the russian economy and by any measure, you look at unemployment, inflation, at an alltime low, investment etc. Whatever measure you want is not good for a russian perspective. The issue of how does that affect the street . At what point do people start turning up and demonstrating, people get organized on a large scale throughout russia, russians are very concerned about that. Thank you, mr. Chair. Thank you, mr. Chairman. In your statement you assess that foreign support will allow damascus to make gains in some key areas of this year. General stuart, you state that the Bashar Alassad regime is unlikely to be militarily defeated or collapse in the near term and poised to enter 2016 in a strong guerrilla military position, and increased support they are receiving from iran and hezbollah and russia. Given Bashar Alassads apparently improving fortunes that we are seeing, do you assess that they will negotiate any transition from power . Certainly in a much stronger negotiating position than he was six months ago. Forces supported by Russian Air Force and iranian and hezbollah forces, are having some affect, not decisive affect across the battlefield. In a much stronger negotiating position and i am more inclined to believe he is up player on the stage longerterm than he was six months to a year ago. In much better position. How would you define longerterm . This one is interesting because the russians are very comfortable with the idea that if they have a regime that supports their interest, Bashar Alassad might not be as important, Bashar Alassad is more important to the iranians to maintain their relationship with syria and the status around lebanon. Giving all parties to agree on whether he should go, the timeline should go, who might be a better alternative, with all the parties, this is such a dynamic space. And change in status for the next year or so and beyond that we will see the fight on the battlefield unfolds. Before i turn to you, when you mention about iran and moscow being able to Work Together on this, diverging in their support for Bashar Alassad and keeping him in power or giving him more leverage, do you think that will come to a head in the short term, long term and consequences of that. I can remember it wasnt that long ago we would all set up, a question on if Bashar Alassad is leaving when he is leaving, that obviously is changed. Eruption reinforcement has change the calculus in the company, tactical relationship that iran and russia has today, at some point, it is hard to predict at some point will diverge because they wont shares the stage. Iran wants to be the regional hegemon, if it has to compete with russia in the longerterm, cant put months or years but inches will diverge because competition is a regional power. In the nearterm, up to pop up the regime and the regime in my mind is not necessarily Bashar Alassad, allows russia to maintain its interests, to allow iran to control c rea, greater syria and parts of lebanon. When those things become tension points, their interests, russia jettisons Bashar Alassad, and a tactical break down and it is irans interest to maintain a relationship with russia because of what we talked about earlier, the ability to procure weapons from russia without any preconditions and would like to modernize military forces and russia seems to be an option. The relationship might be tense. The regional desires for control, they have the enduring relationship for the procurement standpoint. I am out of time but if you have a couple commentslike to add i apologize for giving you less time. That is fine. Both the russians and the iranians are growing interested in using proxys rather than their own forces, russians are incurring casualties, the iranians are and so to the extent, in hizbollah, russians are not wedded to Bashar Alassad, but they have the same challenge as everyone else. If not Bashar Alassad, who . Thank you, mr. Chairman. Thank you for being with us this morning. I was discussing yesterday with one of our partners overall longterm intelligence and worldwide for rats. I am afraid and you touched upon this in your report, the syrian refugee crisis is a precursor of a larger refugee crisis we could be facing over the next and to twentyfirst based on predictions of climate change. The world will be subject to droughts, crop loss, flooding in some areas, and the band around north africa, central africa, southeast asia. We could see mass migrations that could strain the western countries. Would you concur . Alluded to that in the statement about the fact the we have some 60 Million People around the globe displaced in one way or another, and i think if that increases, it will create all those people want to go way things are better. That will place greater stress on the remainder of the countries, with is there in the americas, europe, africa, asia or wherever, and the effects of climate change, whether aberrations or however you describe them, what we have by way of resources to feed and support the growing World Population is of finite resources. Theres only so much water, so much land so the conditions you mentioned i believe are going to comment more fresh air for migrants, not on top of instability of government that i spoke briefly about, will make for a challenging situation in the future. Turning to something you touched inert, the lack of capacity of the drug imports, the real strategic and tactical challenge, we are suffering terribly in my home state of maine, New Hampshire has one death, overdose, 200 year, one that every weekday if you will, we are trying to deal with the demand side, treatment and prevention but keeping this stuff out to begin with, the supply is up. Where should we be putting efforts in the interdictions side . Working with the mexican government, aware great deal of this comes from is mexico. The partnership pecan engender with them. Do they want to stop this . Did they see this as a cash crop . It depends on who they is from mexico, the National Leadership would obviously like to stop the flow but as you know there are very powerful forces in mexico that are against that. We have a lot of money so they also have a corruption problem to deal with. We need to be as aggressive as we can be in interdicting what we can, mentioned earlier for example the tremendous impact of coast guard capabilities when they are brought to bear. As we discussed earlier general kelly, former commander of south calm, spoken to this many times about not so much lack of intelligence but rather lack of Operational Capability to respond, the intelligence capability and capacity needs to be matched by a resource commitment. We need greater commitment than interdiction capacity. End to take is for the record, always at these hearings we talk about cyberthreat, we have done some actions here, got through a cyberbill, and i am concerned about Critical Infrastructure and for the record you could give us some thoughts about what further we should be doing in congress. That is one of the areas of greatest vulnerability. I share your concern. Thank you, mr. Chairman. Thank you for your many years of service to this country. I would like to say this reassuring many members of the committee to vote to give the worlds worst state sponsor of terrorism tens of billions of dollars about what iran might do with that money. I wish we had more of those concerns during the debate and for your vote on it. Ending 45 years of Public Service this is the worst global threat environment you have seen. Is that correct . Say it again and response to a question earlier. That was your point with senator mccain earlier, the worst global threat environment in 46 years. Certainly the most divers a ray of challenges and threats that i can recall. Why is that . Frankly it is somewhat a function of change in the bipolar system that did provide a certain stability in the world. The soviet Union Community alliance, the west led by the United States, and all other threats were subsumed, the contest but went on for decades and was characterized by stability. When that ended