Could be undone. We worked together, senator durbin, on debt consolation. With senator leahy, we worked with instagram. I got to know senator purdue. We were traveling around. Im thinking who is the republican and who is the democrat . Of course they are talking on other subjects very easy to find outlet. But on this stuff, this is like the one thing that you all agree on. It brings out the best in you. Im sure of that. Thank you, mr. Chairman. Thank you mr. Chairman and for being here today and testifying. I certainly agree with all the comments about the importance of aide. It is about our security and the impact of whats happening in europe affecting us in the United States because we do have Transit Alliance that has been critical to world order. We had a hearing this morning in the Foreign Relations committee on isis and international terrorism. One of the conclusions that i drew listening to the testimony and our witnesses generally agreed with this is that we have been good in the United States when it comes to military efforts, so, we were successful in afghanistan and throwing out the taliban, initially. We were successful in iraq in our military efforts. We have been working to try to take back territory from isil that has been successful. But, we have been and we have been successful in efforts to support refugees in camps and make sure aid gets there. We have been less successful when it comes to governance, what many people call nation building, the economic and social implications and the ability to improve governance in countries that are failing. I would like to ask if you all agree with that and the extent to which you see the need to address that as being critical to countering violent extremism and, therefore, how do we do better with what we have been doing in the past . So far, we havent been as successful in those areas as i think we need to be if we are going to address the concerns that we are all talking about today in terms of countering violent extremism. I dont know, i see you blinking. Or nodding, would you like to respond to that first . Blinking. You can blink too. Im the nod, hes the blink. Yeah. No, i think you are right on the mark, senator. The challenge of actually moving from the case of say iraq or syria, from liberating territory and stabilizing but, then rebuilding and not just rebuilding, a political accommodation. Thats where the challenge comes in. You have to look at each country in its particulars. Unless we are able to get at some of the underlying issues, when we succeed, as we always do militarily, it wont be sustainable. What we are trying to focus on in dealing with the programs to counter violent extremism, not working with just natural governments, but local governments, community leaders, municipalities, bringing mayors together to talk about how they are dealing with the challenge in their own community. We are trying to apply metrics and evaluations to see what works and what doesnt to change it. Let me give you a quick example. We just stood up something called the Global Engagement center, our effort to yeah, i want to ask you about that. Maybe to jump into that. One of the critical pieces of the effort against daesh is to get young people to the cost. We were not satisfied with the effort we had going. We brought in a team of technology experts, the socalled sprint team in the silicon valley. They spent a month with us and made recommendations. As a result, rereformed what we were doing. In a nutshell, what we are doing less of now is direct messaging in the voice of the United States. We were not the best messenger in this space. What we are doing, instead, is trying to identify, elevate and build a capacity of local, credible voices. Instead of playing a whackamole game, we immediately tried to counter it. Weve worked on doing it more theme atically. For example, very successfully, we found the testimonies of defectors from isil or daish. What it says to people is what you think you are signing up for is not the reality. They have more credibility than we do saying that. In these ways, we have stood up our effort based on trial and error, what works and doesnt work. We are determined to do it across the board. Can i add to that . Its bizarre, going from observing this culture and how elusive maleness is. We forget how elusive maleness is where material determines you have no access to material things. You exaggerate your maleness. I think you have to think about a young man and think about that. Its funny. Dont laugh. I think comedy should be deployed because if you look at National Socialism and daesh and isil, we have seen this before. Very vain. They have all the signs. Showb showbusine showbusiness. The first people that adolf hitler threw out were the surrealists. You speak violence, you speak their language. You laugh at them when they are goose stepping down the street and it takes away their power. So, im suggesting that the senate send in amy schumer and chris rock and sasha. Thank you. Actually, thats not the first time i have heard experts on how to counter violent extremism. Im actually serious. It is one of the things that i know we are looking at. It also speaks to the importance of empowering women around the world and focusing on human rights for women and children and making sure that they we have the same focus on whats happening with them in particularly countries that where we are seeing violent extremism the most are countries where women have not been empowered. Ugly. A critical need for our Foreign Policy. Thank you. Mr. Chairman. I would like to add a little bit to that. Generally, the practice that we follow over there, many, many years has been one of reacting to bad things. I would suggest that in the years ahead, being proactive has a skill set all to itself in terms of what you could do. First of all, for example, on the security measure, if you you cant do everything everywhere, but lets suggest a failing state in africa the size of nigeria, for example and what that would cause or a failing state like the congo or pick any other large country. So the question is, if you are worried about it now, isnt it cheaper and more effective to engage now proactively, to fix what needs to be fixed, whether its security, by security, i dont mean American Forces or nato forces going into fight, i mean to go in and help people learn how to defend themselves and in some cases you can stitch together entire regions of several countries that would benefit from that kind of training. And while you are doing that, you can encourage the private sector to go in and start showing people how their lives are better in a capitalist system, a free market system, education, distance learning, all these things. The problem is, we tend to do one very well and in the case of afghanistan and iraq, there was no real plan to nation build. I think thats the missing link. If you are going to do one, be prepared to do the other things that have to be there. Its much cheaper to be proactive than reactive. Of that, i am sure. I totally agree with that. I think we havent yet, however, aligned the priorities in our spending in a way that supports that. Look at how much we spend for humanitarian aide, usaid, diplomatic efforts compared to the military side. You know, theres a huge dispari disparity. We have to realign our priorities so we are focusing on prevention than reacting to the situation. We have the benefit of unified geographic commanders in most of the Major Regions of the world and i think that with a little bit of tweaking in the right direction, that is not just security, but Economic Development rule of law that i think you have forward basis in regions we wont affect. I think that would be a good way to engage proactively. Thank you. Senator danes. Thank you, more chairman. This is a great panel today, thank you for being here. Americans are the most generous people in the world when it comes to humanitarian aid and relief efforts that span the globe. At the same time, my fellow colleagues are weighing how best to contribute where the needs are overwhelming. Listen to the needs of the world today, adding limited resources. How do we counterterrorism, provide humanitarian relief and be effective on behalf of the american taxpayer. I want to start with general jones, first of all. I want to tell you, thank you for your service to our country, as the son of a marine, yourself, i got raised right. Thank you for what you have done for our nation. Thank you for coming today. General, in the philippines, at least 18 were killed in fighting a terrorist organization in the southern part of the country. Its indicative to the threat of the Islamic State and asia pacific and the entire world. The u. S. Special forces use strict operations by embedding forces and partnerships as they battle the terrorist organizations on a special task force with the philippines following 9 11. We are seeing them take the approach in resolve. A question for you, someone who has a lot of experience, do you feel this is a way to counter violent extremism . The critical ingredient, i think, that you need to have is, that wherever we engage that the people of that country and the government of that particular country have to want what we are offering. I think imposing what our values and goals are is the long road. In the philippines where i have spent quite a few years, the problem has been with us for a long time. The two or three or four extremist groups that exist there. What worries me is that, if i understand it correctly, theres an effort of appeasement of the violent extremist groups. Personally, im opposed to that. That just gives them a point from which they will expand their base of operations. So, im a little bit removed. I defer to secretary blinken about our current policies. As a matter of principle, i dont favor appeasing extremists. Root them out, stamp them out. A lot of it depends on the will and the capacity of the people. We can help them do these things, but i dont think we can do it for them. Secretary blinken, unforseeable contingencies, the foreign aid is to assist countries and obtain certain humanitarian in which aid is no longer required. As you look at your longer term goals, investing we make in aid, what are some measurable benchmarks that might indicate if a country is utilizing government assistance and what, if any country, can you maybe pull out that could be viewed as a model of success . Sorry. First, the previous question, i agree with general jones on the point he made. We are trying to work be, with and through partners to build their capacity but with them along the way. You are exactly right that ultimately, success for the foreign assistance business is to get out of that business. We want countries to get on their own feet to be effective and provide for their own citizens. Indeed, i deally, we would like to channel as much as possible to the private sector and have it work that way. In the near term, as we look at these programs, we are trying to develop clear measures of effectiveness. Just to give you one example, in the violent extremism space, trying to counter that, on the one hand, its tough to measure how many people didnt become radicalized in a way thats unknowable. But, what we are trying to do is, first of all, have some consistency across the programs. Second, we are making sure that we have third parties come in and evaluate what we are doing, to see if the goals are doing that. In particular, we are trying to look at when we provide assistance and transfer knowledge, how are they using that. Is it making a difference . If you look at the landscape, which country, if you had to stack rank and i realize perfection is never going to be obtainable, but there are Better Outcomes than others. What country is a model of this has been success. You have to look at different areas. Countries in the past are now leading countries around the world if you go further than south korea, for example. Thats a good example. In the present day, it varies program to program, sector to sector. It would be hard to rank order countries across the board. We have seen jordan use some of the assistance we provided to start to make Macro Economic changes. Thats what we are looking for. We have seen other countries not make those changes. Bono, a question, we are talking about a syrian, humanitarian crisis earlier and this potential lost generation of children as the refugee camps turn into long durations throughout much of a lifetime. From your perspective, what would you say is the most effective way to tell this committee, where we can invest american taxpayer dollars to ensure we dont lose the syrian children . In short, listen to miss kelly clemens. I think they are doing a spectacular job. Im glad to hear you think about that and, you know, i have talked to the families and get to know them. You come in as refugees and you come out and have gotten to know them. Syrians are industrious. I was fortunate to be a friend of steve jobs. There was a syrian. He was the son of a syrian migrant and, you know, he had that industriousness. A funny story in the camp, i think it was dutch people were getting 600 bicycles to the camp. Within, i think within minutes, they had set up a bicycle repair shop to deal with the bikes. When the bikes arrived, they had a Delivery Service for pizza before they had the pizza place. These are the best people in the world. They are extraordinary people. They would be so moved to hear you talk about them today. Thank you. Mr. Chairman . Thank you, chairman. Thank you for the chance to have this hearing and to work with you on this important issue. General jones, great to see you, again. I think our last conversation was in rowwandrwanda. Secretary blinken, thank you for your decades of service to the nation in the highest levels and Deputy Commissioner clemens, thank you for your pointed and constructed proposals. One of my hardest days as a senator was with senator graham in jordan. Seeing the enormous challenges and the potential of a refugee camp of people of all ages and backgrounds. Tony lake runs unicef and was a professor of mine in college. We need to realign our imagination, reconsider the funding that we provide for humanitarian relief in an emergency situation and the investments we make and recognize that millions of refugees are likely to be outside their countries of origin for a long period of time. If we change direction and make investments in a wiser, more targeted way in partnership with allies across the world, we could make a difference, not just in combatting extremism although that is a goal today, but to build up human kind and relieve suffering. Bono, i was moved to hear you talk about how the American People are generally generous. Our investment laid the foundation for a western europe that is united, stable and free and your reference threw the work of senior senators touched the lives of 9 million. I will mention the ebola where volunteers from around the world worked with the United States in turning around the tragic disease. I am encouraged and challenged by your oped in the New York Times and what i have heard about from you in the ways we ought to be working together to craft a more disciplined and thoughtful plan. General, in your written temperatu testimony, we have a good call to arms. Sophisticated, serious and passional as any fight in history, designed and resourced as if the future depends on it, because it does. Thats right. With the time remaining, speak to, if congress were to embark on a large scale plant for foreign assistance that combined all the elements, Real Investment alongside humanitarian relief, partner to prevent fragile states from becoming failed states, what would it look like . What conditions would you put on aid . How would you decide which countries come in that arc and which would be out of it and how would we tell the American People how long this would last and what our goals are. General, i would be interested in the role u. N. Peacemaking. Secretary blinken, how far you think we are toward developing and delivering this and Deputy Commissioner, how you see the plate and role of refugees. Think big and tell us how you would structure it, if you would, please. Thank you, senator. Ill try to be very brief. I just am of the opinion that we are in order to deal with the challenges and the threats that face us and mankind, really, that we have to approach it a little bit differently. When i was National Security adviser, we tried to work on the more holistic approach to responding to international threats, things like cyber security, energy security, water security, Food Security and of course the conventional definition of security we lenned on in the 20th century. In the world we face today, people have choices and people know a lot more and people in the disadvantaged developing countries have access to information that shows them that they dont have to live like this. The battle is on between extremist ideologies who captivate the minds and say the reason you are not doing better is because of these guys. Generally, they point to us. Im very optimistic that if we can put together a strategic concept for how each administration deals with these kinds of problems, more holistically to include the private sector and the Public Sector working together, to advance the idea that america doesnt have to do this alone. What we can do, i think better than anybody, is certainly provide assets and resources and also provide an organizing principle around which other countries would follow. The north atlantic treaty is an example of an organization of 28 countries with a fantastic history. What is its future . If we cant lead that organization into the 21st century by being more proactive, preemptive and more strategic in thinking, which saves money in the long term, then i think we have a difficult time. So, leadership, u. S. Leadership, i think, in organizing principles to do these things, to Bring International public and private sectors together. To help countries that are on the fringe of going one way or the other in terms of democracy and whose people know exactly what they are missing and will not hesitate to move by tens of thousands from the mediterranean from africa to europe if they dont see hope for