Decade has not just her and run defense budget, modestly 1. 6 billion increase. It would be nice to see it continue, but everyone watches very carefully to see the leading indicator, which is us and what were willing to do. Taiwan is a country rushing to the exit to make sure nothing comes between it and china and therefore i would argue the same credibility over whether the United States would intervene and i Taiwan Strait scenario, but we can expect the support and could even see treaty allies that would be required, for example, logistics and the like want to stay out of it because they question whether we are committed to it and it said it would drag them in and leave them exposed to the situation in which stability had to start good to conflict and violence. Just really quickly because freds comments reminded me of a concluding remark i wanted to make in the opening statement, but its important to bring us back to the larger political discussion. Not only are we failing to manage the world in a way that will leave our children with a safer environment and judging by the faces and looking at you people, with a been a lot of work for you to do. But were leaving many last name to deal with it. And not just because we demobilizing after a war, even if you accept that paradigm. Its because the money is going to entitlement programs. The money you might want to be mobilized to defend yourselves of the future is going to be in my baby boomer Retirement Health care accounts. We can either try to do it then, take away entitlements in a crisis circumstance or governor appetites now so sunday we wake up and discover the world remains a dangerous place and we have to do something about it that involves using armed force that we can then mobilize their wealth to do that. We are setting ourselves up for circumstances in the not too far distant future we should be much, much harder and historically unprecedented situation to be in. Lets open up questions. Forgive me, but i dont have a mic to hand around, so repeat your question so its audible for the audience as well outside. The shaman nisi handover here. [inaudible] [inaudible] the question as to the criticism of the Obama Administration on its actions in a variety of al qaeda firm somalia, yemen was persuasive. But whats the right answer . Well, i dont have a right answer and there isnt a right answer for any of these various places, but i think we need to get jan in review of troops on the ground cumin no troops on the ground in the situation here. I do think it is in our interest to find a way to work with local partners in order to combat local groups and allow them to cover their territories with their own forces. Unfortunately, the way to do that involves putting boots on the ground. We have a long tradition. It was started by a democratic president who is enthusiastic about this kind of thing as john f. Kennedy and this is one of the things the special forces were created to do. It is a train and advise mission and its enabled mission. If we had been doing that in yemen, we would in a somewhat better place. The questions are what do you do where you dont have partners where they can succeed in what he thought the escalation ladder and are you drawn into a war in every place . The answer is you dont want to be a knowhow to make our decision in each case about the risk of going down one path or another. So its got to be contingent. It cant be ideological, which is a highly ideological in the opposite direction from the bush years. Now will never put troops on the ground to advise and assist and train our allies. You cant allow yourself come you cant allow your brain to be shortcircuited by slippery slope arguments. We always live on a slippery slope. The question is making the right decision and you really cant make the decision honestly until you see concrete choices in front of you in each case. [inaudible] talk about issues in the western has here come the cube cuba, venezuela, and stability from the drug cartels in mexico. Questions about the western hemisphere, something i didnt even touch on, i made that went unmentioned, seanez, and the instability from the drug cartels. Can you talk about that, tom, a little bit . This is going to be in on economy of force response, the first of all, you know, other than actual physical defense, the cotton on the United States or legal United States has been our principal security interest since before we were a nation. Its clearly a moment in time and of course through history, gone back and forth between regimes in that area. And we have a lot of partners with whom we could be working. Our Model Partnership with columbia, which has been a pretty lowlevel thing, but one which the house of representatives has traditionally kept very close tabs on his same model counterinsurgency partnership. If we had that model in some other middle east engagement, we wouldve been much better off also today. But it suggests again its possible to work with the brazilians, for example. Princelings were the leading force in the u. N. Issued in haiti. So some good things have been happening, even why the cartel breaches have been hot and very serious threat to the civilians in mexico, so absolutely. Likewise its going to take a traditional approach that theres no doing this on the cheap. That part of the problem at this table, Roger Noriega is not this table. Latin america, western hemisphere doesnt get addressed unless his latest shot is how. Castro lives or dies, seanez lives or dies. Maybe an election in venezuela or iran purcell, but that is what makes the newspaper and thats part of the problem. Its also part of the challenge to congress. A big part of the answer to every single question is you cant beat something with nothing. If you want to be to construct that america must retreat and disengage from the world, which is the one embraced radio button administration, youve got to be for something and that means capital hill. If much much is it better to lead astray from the American Enterprise institute, were not capable of doing that. Thats a historic reality. In the 1990s when bill clinton said theres an election based on that, it was the house and senate that legislative sanctions on iran, the push for, like it or not, freedom for the iraqi people to push for sanctions on cuba, to push her more engagement and exactly which are talking about, that really pushed for in a relationship with india. I could go on and on. Nato expansion. All the things taken for granted but not in initiative. Theyre members of congress on capitol hill who change the world in a very meaningful way and thats still an opportunity if we recognize we need to care about. Sorry for that little speech. How do we know kind of the counterterrorism, is very much her . [inaudible] the question is how do we know when weve won . Were in no danger of women anytime soon. This has become a sugarless because its a fair question obviously. What you measure for success and how do we know when we stopped, and that we are so far away from that now a more further away than when this president took office in the policies hes recommending will take us further and further from that because until we can start measuring the hectares covered by al qaeda affiliate, i guarantee you a question of whether weve won or not is nonoperative and right now the measurement is on the increase rather than decrease. So its a fair question, but we need to recognize where we are in history. This is more like stalingrad 1943. Hopefully well stop retreat here and at that point, the soviets were not thinking so much about what kind of peace they were going to impose on germany when they were done. Theyre rethinking how to recover the ground it lost in their own interest and thats where we are now because it was so much ground were about to lose so much more that that is the conundrum that faces us now. I do think theres an answer that if you look back, we were planning an iraq in the search after 2007, but winning is not just a game in the playground. Its not just a thank you very much welcome here now. Winning requires maintenance and when you choose not to, its very easy to go back to losing again. The implications may not be obvious to later, but they written a great deal on what the implications of having to live in iraq have meant for the stability of the country and for our own National Interest in the National Interest of our allies in the middle east. Yes, sir. [inaudible] what would were between japan and trip japan and china the click click i can make conventional and unconventional. I didnt think it would be a warlike 1930s. I didnt think it would be nice if they follow were. First of all, i think will happen is theyre going to be an accident. The japanese have sent at their fighter patrol jets. The chinese have responded, japanese firing warning shots. That would be inactive were to do that. You have the coast guard and Maritime Patrol vessels of china jockey with each other, bumping into each other. Somebodys going to die. Its going to be an accident of some kind in an bp three events. And thats a question of the rules of engagement each side has. Japan is a treaty ally, so what we do now is the assistant secretary of state was sent there last week along with the head of a ship for the National Security council and the ast handles asia and department of defense telling the japanese to calm down, not to push too far. When we read that in the paper, you can be sure the chinese read it as well interpret they have more leeway to push on these things. Said a conflict can be any type of conflict, but its highly militarized small area right now if something happens, but the japanese do . Today after consultations with the u. S. , which would certainly regard as an escalation. To invoke article v of the security treaty and ask for help in selfdefense . What do we decide were going to give them . Rightfully scared forces out of that immediate area. The credibility of the alliance is on the line. We say that a lot, but the japanese have enticed a number with taiwan and china for several years now and if we did not back them up at a time when Japanese Military lives are being lost, then release are forward base base in the pacific and from that arent tired strategic linchpin from others. [inaudible] [inaudible] the question is a bacteria and what the United States should do. He suggested at the beginning next year is one of the better developed countries in the middle east. Syria has never been one of the better developed countries in the middle east. Baptism is socialism and socialism doesnt work anywhere, least of all the place with no Natural Resources in stateowned industries. Said syria was not doing well at all prior to the up week of the civil war. The problem is that theres no good exit option in syria. There is no good outcome here. This is the argument underpins everything weve been trying to say here, which is in the beginning been a problem, its always easier to solve it. It may not come out pop tamale. You may not get an a or b. Answer or even ac answer. Now all you can get our asked answers because the decision by the United States not to involve itself in the Obama Administration, not to involve itself in the searing conflict has done exactly what we promote, what fred talked about in libya, that it has subcontracted policy to qatar and other countries who do not have the same taste in rebels that we do too but not too fine a point on it. So when you look at blowback from libya and i see yourself, why is it to people with whom we are now defending him against whom we are now defending ourselves in benghazi or others or weapons have fallen out by such islamist extremist clerics the answer is because those who would like 92 as and chose to act against gadhafi, choose to act in a way thats anathema to us. We are lucky because of our limited involvement that we have a government there that is a moderate government, a government of people that try to pull ambassadors meeting murdered rather than push them into one. The world will see in syria this opportunist islamists extremists groups and other local groups have come to the forefront. They are well armed and so a rebellion that began as one at least in part secular and had no religious basis and was brought together by universal opposition to Bishara Lessard is not infiltrated by all sorts of al qaeda and related groups. So when assad files come as a question, when assad falls, what will be left is a well armed seething feuding mass on the border of iraq, turkey, jordan, lebanon and israel. It is as if we live in a sand as the world to think the implications of the conflict have absolutely no meaning for our National Security. Its a disaster and what we can do now is try and contain a disaster and hasten the movement of assad out and ensure whoever is in charge actually is a group or a group of groups that respects and values the kind of values we have rather than the values that qatar has. My colleagues want to add something. This is also the case where we pay the price for having persuaded ourselves that iraq was a country located somewhere on the man and doesnt actually share common borders of any place on the earth that is of any significance to us. Because we adopted that approach because secondarily the frustration decided that moore, lecky was her best friend and the guy we needed to back it all cost, the result is iraq has been feeding the situation is syria in two ways. One is iranian weapons and various other things have been traveling through iraq on the way to support the assad regime is that murders people in the Al Qaeda Organization in iraq was supported from the outset by a Logistics Base and so forth that if god had allowed to exist in syria reverse polarity and has been exporting back in a serious radicalizing the movement from iraq. Now we see continued spillover into a back of the sick tyrian bonnet, but the restraints made of the al qaeda franchise in iraq. So its time to recognize that iraq and syria share a common order and the tribes across the border to talk to each other and the highways that go between those two countries carry terrorists in both directions. What we are now seen as a problem that will begin to expand exponentially as the al qaeda groups and affiliate both countries try to strengthen the fact they are gaining in both countries have been supported by the coteries and others in both countries that we are providing no support, played no role whatsoever. Just really quickly. Youve got to even open up the aperture a bit more. This source open in a regional contact defined by the u. S. Withdraw. 2008 the u. S. Was in a really very strong position. Nobody liked us, but they dont like us now either. But our actual power in the region was at an historic high water mark. They were collapsing from iraq to afghanistan. Many situations just taking a pass on actively and syria being the number one. The other engagement involvement that we did pursue libya is not to recommend nation. Im not sure the assad regime is going to lose. The ray nance will help the regime last a lot time. The russians and chinese will defend them internationally if not resupply them and at some point theyll go up, not down. You have a middle east where the u. S. Has increased and blocks contending for power. The arabian, steering with great power sponsorship from russia and china in the sunni increasing phalluses part of the region which will maintain some sort of alliance with united case, but not one that will be able to direct as we have up to 2008. So this could turn into some name, a really ugly very rapidly. Thats only if you think 80,000 people dead is not ugly. Yes, sir. Adding a mac foreignpolicy and especially security systems. This is another area where Congress Really has a role to play. The administration is basically decided that Mohamed Morsi at egypt is the new mubarak. The guy in the seat we will now help. Its completely indifferent to what our aid program should look like and what the desired outcome and egypt should be. The only thing they appear to be interested in is the continuation of the israeli egyptian camp david accords, which are obviously of great interest, but not really the only thing they should animate us and we talk about the largest country in the middle east. When i thought we were delivering fighter jets to the egyptian military, i just asked myself, what message does this send . The rule should be not the foreign aid is bad and not that foreign aid is good and not that military assistance is good or bad, it is the u. S. Taxpayer dollar used to further u. S. Tax your interest and every time a new government comes into power, we should take that aid down to zero and build it anew. Does that mean we should give everybody the same as before . Maybe it does. Does that mean we should give them zero . Could be. Does that mean we should give them more . Also a possibility. The autopilot is unconscionable and thats the problem we have now is where an autopilot. Im not talking about the contract stopping building whatever sewage plant in whatever country. Obviously things are going on in pipelines in our foreign aid. The issue is the message we send, that we become hysterical. Our aid must end and the answer is no, dont do it based on that. Obviously thats an exit poll. They should be based on a whole array of questions relating to where the flaw, treatment treatment of minorities, economic raise, action towards allies. All of those things are known factors and it seems as everybody is sending better to do than have an aggressive oversight hearing on the question at egypt. Take it down and nothing to build afresh. Sorry, i have very strong opinions on that question as you can here. Agreed entirely with that on the sometimes i think we get caught up in the focus on our values, which is important in our age should be reflecting immense unshaved advancing values. Why do we care about the welfare of individual egyptians are about these other things. We care because he speaks directly to the Egyptian State of the longterm and the ability to govern in peace and control territory and deny the territory of Popular Support to our enemies. Thats why we do for me these days am part of the problem is when foreign aid was crafted originally put under cont