 I want to say thank you to all of you for coming and certainly sincere thanks to General Flynn who took, he's pretty busy these days, he's really busy these days and not just because of yesterday, yesterday was a bad day. I think many of us, I personally was surprised it was 11 years before we had something like this happen in this country. It was a bad day, but there are families and communities and homes and cities throughout South Asia that experience these days every day and they have been going on nonstop. It's been an astounding thing to watch this region be torn apart by people who think they're trying to save this region. So yesterday was a reminder really, we could become completely obsessed with ourselves and that's a typical pattern here and we likely will. But I would like us with this session to remain focused on this larger picture today. And we're very, very fortunate that General Flynn has offered time to come up. He literally is going to race up to the hill, he's got testimony today. So we're very lucky to have him come to launch this effort to look at terrorism in South Asia and the radicalization that continues and how this dynamic is going to play out in different ways in the months and years ahead. And so we're very fortunate to have him here. He's one of the most talented intelligence officers I've ever met. He's devoted a career to this and with great distinction has commanded at virtually every level. And of course now heads up the Defense Intelligence Agency, which is a foundation for intelligence services for the entire government. So he's given us this time, we're very happy for that. Time is going to moderate the Q&A session. But would you please with your applause, thank and welcome General Flynn for coming today. Thank you. Okay. I'm going to try to go through some prepared remarks here and get to some Q&A here as we go. A couple of things. One, obviously, I'll bring your attention, I'll mention it again, but this great report that's sort of being touted today and again I'll mention it and I'll talk a little bit about it and talk a little bit about what it means. A couple of other documents that I think are very important documents. One is a speech that was given by Dr. Carter here not too long ago. And I think if you haven't read it, it's worth reading it, it's online. And the other is from our new Secretary of Defense, Secretary Hagel, his speech to National Defense University. I think it's also worth reading because it does talk, both of these talk to sort of portend to what we are facing now and certainly in the future as we go forward with both what I basically describe as two conditions. The operational environment that has definitely fundamentally changed and as we try to be as clairvoyant as we can in the future, it's very, very difficult, sort of very foggy gray matter that's out there and it's hard to see. And then the second condition is really not just the national fiscal environment but the global fiscal environment. And I think that those conditions definitely are raised and highlighted inside of this report and that's sort of part of what I will try to bring out today. So I'm just going to go through some prepared remarks here and then we'll go to questions. So first, John, I just want to say thanks very much for this invitation and I want to thank CSIS for putting on this event and for all the things that you do as an institution for certainly for our country. This center has produced an important study on the trends in militancy across South Asia and this paper gives us a lot to consider and I'm certain it will lead to good discussions throughout today as well as into the future. DIA is postured to capitalize on the fruits of the partnership between our agency and CSIS and again I just thank you for your invite today. Our mission is to prevent strategic surprise by providing our warfighters and our national security leaders the best intelligence and a decision advantage as they navigate a very complex threat environment. With over 16,000 employees in 262 locations around the world including 142 countries we are globally postured and honing our expeditionary workforce to tackle tomorrow's hardest defense intelligence problem sets. Our people boast a broad range of skills necessary to accomplish our mission. For instance, 6,000 of our men actually over 6,000 of our men and women have served on one or more deployments in combat and conflict zones over the past decade gaining tremendous expertise and operational experience. Additionally, over 1,000 DIA personnel speak a foreign language covering over 60 different languages. We are planning to further expand our language capacity in the coming years to enhance our ability to collaborate abroad. With nearly 50% of our workforce in their 20s and 30s 10 years ago that was less than 25% and much of their career still ahead of them this is an investment that we believe will pay off and DIA will be better postured than ever before to defend against threats like growing militancy in South Asia. I'd like to turn now to the subject of the day and within that a couple of elements first the ISAF transition, Afghan presidential and provincial elections, growing populations in the region, regional competition, resource scarcity, religious and ethnic tensions and an unfavorable financial outlook will present militant groups with numerous exploitable opportunities. These are security issues driven by political, sociocultural and economic factors. These factors foster the root causes of young men, primarily young men, picking up weapons and joining militant and criminal groups. Together they allow militant groups to garner popular support, recruit followers and propagate fear. Beyond the more observable insecurity triggered by violence and criminality these groups are a threat to the interconnectedness that is vital to this region's stability and security. Since 2001 militant groups have increasingly cooperated with each other with a resulting blend of ideology, tactics and facilitation networks. Blurred lines between militant groups will only increase the uncertainty of motives for and sponsors of violence. This uncertainty means that state actors may become increasingly unpredictable which is an ingredient for regional instability. As we move forward we need to expand beyond military capabilities as we examine defense and security issues. Together we must avoid what this report calls an inability to see the whole board and an atomized and reactionary approach to the array of militant groups in South Asia. Examining the laundry list of South Asia militant groups, two clear strengths of these groups emerge, agility and interconnectedness. Militant agility serves as an advantage against large, stove piped, hierarchical organizations like the established security and political institutions in the region. Meanwhile, the growing overlap of violent extremists, criminals and complicit state officials, enhances the potential impact of their operations. And here's the real kicker for all of us in the international security business. The resiliency and protection these groups gain from integration creates challenges for military, intelligence and law enforcement responses. So what does this mean for the Defense Intelligence Agency? DIA is currently transforming to keep pace with this new normal and a rapidly shifting threat environment. At the heart of this effort is a belief that despite challenges like rising militancy, the biggest threat to our security may be an inability to work together. Within DIA, within our intelligence, military and law enforcement partners, and with our friends around the world, simply put, the established way of executing the intelligence mission must be constantly challenged, and we must adapt. There is a great line in this CSIS Militancy Report that I'd like to read, and I'll quote it. An array of increasingly flat, decentralized groups have built stronger ties with each other and have collaborated on operations against common enemies while sharing information, tactics, and resources. I mean, I could write that about a lot of things. I could definitely write that about what we're trying to do just in the US intelligence community and what we've certainly been doing for the last, trying to do for the last decade. I think that that quote is a great line, and it says a lot about the future of what we face, both from a threat and both from how we need to be thinking about how we should operate. And we are actually trying to do something similar at DIA. So in our transformation, what I call sort of our vision for 2020 driving change through integration, we have established integrated intelligence centers that bring multidisciplinary teams together to produce fused, warning, analysis, and operational opportunities for a diverse customer base of warfighters and policy makers. Beyond DIA, these centers will provide enterprise-wide leadership on the hardest defense intelligence topics, helping to unite interagency and international efforts. Each element has specialized expertise and a core set of responsibilities that they will continue to hone and strengthen in this joint interagency and international environment. And I'm glad to see partners here from around the world as well. The future of this joint enterprise will be based on trust and confidence in each other's core competencies. But we have to start now. As Bill McRaven, our commander of our special operations forces, states, during times of crises, you cannot surge trust. You have to build it as you go. This operating model is, for us, is just not a sort of nice to have enabler. It is now a necessity, especially as budget realities and growing intelligence requirements demand integration and increasingly collaboration. This is true from the tactical to the strategic level. There is not an individual analyst, operator, intelligence agency, law enforcement element, non-governmental organization, diplomatic mission or nation who single-handedly can provide a comprehensive picture of the threat and the operating environment. After a decade of war, which we are still in, we've learned that lesson in spades. And we've developed cross-cutting relationships to thicken our networks. As General McChrystal was always prone to say, organizations don't work together. People work together. So we have to build upon the relationships that we've established over this last decade, many of which, those relationships have been honed in combat in places like Iraq, Afghanistan and elsewhere, certainly around that particular region. Looking at the international and interagency flavor of the groups that are represented today and all the professionals that are here attending today's forum, it is clear that this is really what today is about and I think the message that the report tries to bring about is this idea of understanding the problem and then bringing the right kinds of organizations together, you know, not only here in the United States but internationally. And so, John, again for that and to CSIS, I want to say thanks for allowing me to share a few thoughts and I look forward to answering your questions. Thank you. Yeah, it would probably be better if that's all right. Good morning, folks, and thank you for joining us. My name is Tom Sanderson, co-director of the Transnational Threats Project. General Flynn, thank you very much for those superb remarks. Please identify yourself during the Q&A session, your name and your organization, and please don't make a statement, offer a question. And to the extent you can, please confine your questions to the subject at hand, either South Asia or terrorism. Okay, and we'll have microphones so please wait for the microphones in the middle here, ma'am. Toby Zakaria with Reuters, news agency. General, there was a bit of a fluffle recently over a DIA assessment on North Korea. People pointed to it as perhaps an outlier of the intelligence community's assessment on whether North Korea can put a nuclear warhead on a missile. Can you address that? Was the DIA assessment an outlier? So, one of the things that you learned from really good public affairs people is answer the question you want to have asked, you know? And so, you know, I want to talk about South Asia today and the impact of the report, not the Near East there. So, appreciate the question and I'm going to stick to sort of the topic of the day. Thank you. Yeah, question, though. General Justin Fischel with Fox News. Thanks for taking the question and keeping in mind what you just said, I do think it's important to address that report and there is a lot of interest. What exactly happened? How did that unclassified portion get marked unclassified and are you looking into who might be responsible for that and actually more importantly, I feel obligated to ask you about the bombings in Boston yesterday and I'll just put it simply, do you have any idea who did this and why and do you have any indication that this could be something from overseas, any intelligence chatter that would lead you to believe that? And again, I apologize for going off topic. Yeah. And that's your job, right? As I'm trying to ensure, I do my job. First of all, what happened yesterday in Boston and I had, in fact, my nephew ran the damn marathon and he called my brother, he was a block away from it. So, and I'm certain that as we learn more about some of those that were seriously injured, I mean, I'm from up in New England, I'm from Rhode Island. I know my sister actually has run that marathon multiple times. I mean, she's got about probably a couple of dozen times around the Boston Marathon and so it's a real tragedy and the viciousness in the way this thing was executed is really sad and I'll just let it stand at that. And I think what's appropriate for today is to remind people that in South Asia in this region that's discussed in this report, there are 27 that we can account for different militant groups. So 27 and I got a laundry list of them here and of course there's not only one country, they're in the region. And one of the things that I like to look at, one of the things that I started to study a couple of years ago was populations. And I've been fascinated by them. In fact, in my back pocket I carry around a little card that lays out about roughly about 20 countries where population growth is seriously on the rise and those are countries where those countries are either poorly governed, under governed, not governed. And I think it's really important that we understand that element. In terms of that issue, because I think it's important for everything that we're doing today because I believe that the expansion of the people on the planet, the revolution in the information domain that allows what I call, it provides a voice to the voiceless and the challenges that we are facing sort of what I highlighted about our fiscal environment are going to cause all of us to have to really make some, thanks, really make some decisions about where we're going in the future. Not necessarily South Asia, but it is definitely, this has to do with population growth, but it is definitely a problem that we have to face and understand what does it mean. So if we look at a planet, our planet that has doubled in population in 60 years, just 60 years. So the previous 2000, 1950, a global census was taken and we had about 3.4 billion people. The next global census taken was 2010, roughly close to 7 billion. We've surpassed 7 billion. In the next 20 years, we're gonna surpass it even more. The rise, India is supposed to surpass China in population growth between now and I think it's 2040. They're projected at another 600 million people just in India alone. So when you talk about Pakistan, you talk about Afghanistan, you talk about the region, Nepal, all these different countries, I think that it's important that we recognize that. The second part is the economic conditions that exist or don't exist, poor or good. And we have to recognize what does that mean if, like I said, if young men get up in the morning and they have no hope that their government's gonna give them any hope and they are essentially hopeless, they will turn to other things, especially the sort of between 15 and 25 year old crowd, mostly young men. And the rise of criminality, of transnational organized crime, of militant groups that have desires and intentions to do other things, either to gain control of some territory or to spread an ideology is something that we are all gonna have to face. And I think that that's a really important component that definitely comes out very strong in this report. That's one of the big takeaways for me. And it reinforces what I believe that as we move into the future, we are going to have to face a different climate, you know, a different operational climate, a different fiscal climate and definitely how we organize ourselves to be able to function against some of these threats that we are going to face. You know, all that said, in addition to the traditional, conventional capabilities that nation states still possess around the world, okay? I mean, in this region, you are, this region is surrounded, you know, two of which have nuclear capabilities to, you know, but in this region, you're surrounded by nuclear states of Pakistan, India, certainly China to the east and Russia to the north. And then the emergence of the threat of Iran's, you know, intentions to move in the same direction. So that's just another characteristic, if you will, of what we have to deal with in addition to the issues highlighted in today's report. So that's a long answer to a question I wish I was asked and I'll take the next question. That's great. Thank you, General. That was superb. And as the moderator, I can guarantee you my question will deal with the report. I understand the pressure to, in the interest in asking questions outside the report, but we invited the general here today to speak about this. We spent 15 months over a dozen people working very hard in this report. So we're going to confine the questions there. The question I have, General, is looking at how militant groups will portray the withdrawal of US-led international forces from the region. As my boss, Arnold DeBorgrave, frequently points out in 1989 in February when General Gromov crossed the peace bridge into modern day Uzbekistan, this began the downfall in the viewpoint of many people of the Soviet Union and militants, including bin Laden, often pointed to this moment as the beginning and the end and nine months later, the Berlin Wall fell. What do we do? What do we expect from militant groups as they look at this withdrawal as yet another superpower to fall? Yeah, so I'm an intelligence officer head of an intelligence agency for the United States. So I'm going to stick to the latter part of Tom's great question, which is really about perceptions and not get into the policy issues that are definitely in play with all sorts of leaders across certainly the United States and the international community that are deeply involved in solving the problems that we have, not just in Afghanistan, in support of the great people of Afghanistan, but also throughout the region. And I think that if there is a sense that on December 31st, 2014, and it's just going to go, and that's it, I don't think that the sense of certain of the groups, they don't necessarily have that. I do think that they do believe that there is a sense that the international community will continue to be to demonstrate the resiliency and the resolve to stay the course and to achieve the goals that certainly our nation has set out to do and the international community has set out to do. I think that the perceptions of some of the less informed organizations, they'll message and they'll do all sorts of things to certainly message in the region. But I think the ones that are paying very close attention, their perceptions are that we probably are demonstrating the willingness to be resilient and present the resolve to be able to stay the long course. I think that the people of Afghanistan, certainly the people of the region, they deserve to be able to live and thrive in an area that has enormous human capital potential as well as resource potential that can help other parts of the world in the future. And I think that that's been clearly recognized over the last decade. So that's sort of where I'm at today. Thank you, General. There's a woman in the third row here, please. They're going to give you a mic so everybody else can hear. Thank you. My name is Fawzia Saeed. I'm from Pakistan and I'm a fellow at NED, National Endowment for Democracy. My question is, I want to know your opinion about the role of Saudi Arabia vis-a-vis the militancy in South Asia, because many people in Pakistan believe that a lot of these militant outfits are funded by Saudi money. And also there is a specific kind of interpretation of Islam, a specific ideology, which is very different from what I was, my generation was raised up with, has been exported to South Asian Muslims. So I want to know your opinion on that. Well, I'm sorry. Yeah, I just went off. The one component of it, I will try to dissect briefly. And that's really the financial networks that exist in the world of militancy or the world of these different organizations. And, you know, LISIT, which are OK, and ILLISIT, which are not OK, networks of these financial networks, certainly in the gray market world and in the black market world. I think that we have to, you know, the old adage of follow the money, we have to pay very, very close attention to where funding resources are coming from and funding resources don't always come from external places, but they also come from internal places. I mean, you know, the kidnapping market as an example of a means to just get even little bits of money at times. So I think that we have to be really smart and we definitely have to use all the resources that we have to address the financial networks that exist out there that are maintaining some of these militant groups and supporting them and where we discover nation states that are behind some of these what appear to be sort of non-state networks, we have to obviously, you know, do diligence to ensure that they understand that those are the kinds of things that we don't appreciate because they definitely lead to just greater violence and greater chaos. On the ideology question, I think that's a really good one. And I think that the ideology is something that we, you know, I mean, you described how you were brought up and then another form of an ideology that maybe is, you know, it's kind of like, you know, the doctrine of different Christian religions is relatively the same. It's the traditions that are different. I mean, just to be really general and on that sort of, from a religious aspect. But I think the ideology is something that we have to pay very, really close attention to. It is something that we don't understand. It is something that, you know, as I've read a couple of, you know, good books on it and I've had the opportunity to sit down with former terrorists and definitely militants and others that I would consider subject matter experts who live in those regions to try to explain to me what is it that I'm missing or we're missing. I think that we really do have some educating to do about what this type of ideology is that's out there that exists. So people just don't throw their hands up and go, you know, oh, they're crazy or something. I mean, that's not it at all. It's to understand what it is that we face. You know, when you go back a century, when we were facing things like fascism, Nazism, you know, communism, capitalism, Islamism. I mean, whatever the ism is, we have to definitely understand it. We have to understand it better rather than, you know, those individuals who, when I was deployed a lot, you get the question, well, what's the one thing that we're not doing? That's the wrong question. Because if there's no one single answer, there's a multitude of answers, but part of it is to really do the studying so we understand what it is that we're facing. And I think that that's an important aspect of something that we have definitely, that is a right lesson learned from a decade of war, and as we transition out, we can't lose that lesson. Great. Thank you. Folks, we're down to two minutes, so I'm going to ask Harlan Nolman and the gentleman in the middle here to ask their questions back to back and then have the general provide the answer. Please keep them brief. So. I'm Harlan Nolman. General, good to see you again, and thanks for your comments. Very simple question about Pakistan. What is your assessment of a Arab spring-like or colored revolution taking hold in Pakistan, given all the travail that's underway, including the election that takes place next month? Great. And Jack, if you can give the microphone to the gentleman in the middle for his question, and that, unfortunately, will be it. Go ahead, sir. Hopefully no surprises today. Thank you very much, General Flynn. How do you analyze, or is there a good analysis, net analysis of two opposite forces? One, Iran sanctions have driven her financial network to South Asia, from Macau to Malaysia, and that's bad, but they also have less money to finance exactly the sort of flat in our connectivity that you were talking about. That's good. What is the net analysis? Thank you. Ashari Arrahi from UDI. The hub of Iran's financial network has moved to South Asia as a result of sanctions. They're doing more business there. That's bad for terrorism in South Asia. On the other hand, Iran has much less money to finance that sort of flat in their connectivity that you were talking about, which they've learned very well and transported from experiences in Iraq, Afghanistan, et cetera. That's good because they have less money. What is your net analysis of these two opposite forces? Sorry, it keeps going on. About 1030, 1045 Greenwich Mean Time today, one of the worst earthquakes hit in 40 years hit the border of Iran and Pakistan today. So we'll see what the news is reporting is that there are hundreds, potentially hundreds of people that have died from this earthquake. We'll see what the results were. This literally was in the last couple hours. An 8.0 earthquake, it shook almost, it was reported 70-something miles deep. It's felt in New Delhi and Dubai. So must be pretty substantial. I tell you that one, because I think it's relevant to everything that we're dealing with because these kinds of this issue and the need for international aid and the need for all sorts of stuff and just the challenges that face some of these governments to be able to take care of their own folks. I mean, like we've seen around the world in humanitarian disasters, I think are gonna be something that we have to pay real close attention to. So I think that the capabilities of the governments, so Iran, Pakistan, India, Afghanistan, the Central Asian Republics, China and Nepal, I mean, that sort of the wider region really, really have to be understood for what is their capability to achieve, to be able to provide security and stability for their own people and to be able to also offer opportunities not only for the people in their own countries but for the people in the wider region. I think that that's important. The trade, the markets that are open between over borders and things like that. So those kinds of sort of commercial economic issues are tested all the time. And I hope that that touches a little bit on your question. On the Arab Spring, I don't know what the outcome is. Arab Winter, Spring, Summer, Fall, this Arab movement and this movement of, I think, to achieve some, as I said earlier, to achieve some level of hope in a different way. And I think that as we assess it and we look at the conditions that are underlying what is causing it, do those kinds of conditions exist in South Asia? Absolutely. Is it likely, I don't think so specifically to Pakistan, I think they're the strength of on a variety of levels is really pretty good shape. But I think that we always have to be concerned and make sure that we, again, work very closely, partner very closely with every country that's in this region. And I mean, I've always been a big proponent of greater intelligent sharing just as one. And information sharing, certainly in the information environment that we're facing today, which is different. And we do have a unique advantage, I think, in the intelligence system that the United States has. I think it provides us a strategic advantage, frankly, when it's properly focused, when it's correctly prioritized, and that's a daily ongoing discussion to be able to address some of the issues that get at really the heart of your question. So thanks for that question. And I'll just finish by again saying, it's good to see some old friends here and thanks very much to CSIS for the invite and that concludes my Q&A. Thank you. Thank you. Great. Thank you, General.