 Thank you for joining us on yet another hot July morning, but it's for a hot topic. So thank you for being here. Yeah. My name is Nancy Lindborg. I'm the president of the United States Institute of Peace. And we really are gathered here for an important, and I assure you, lively, conversation about the future of Iraq and, as it turns out, at a very, very critical moment. I'm sure everybody is keenly aware of the events that occurred in Iraq over this last week when President Abadi was able to go to Mosul and declare victory over ISIS. So we congratulate the government of Iraq, the people of Iraq, the global coalition for really what is an extraordinary moment in a long fought battle over a number of years. And I think as we are also very keenly aware, with this success comes a whole new set of challenges. And the stabilization of Iraq, which we'll be talking about today, is a key concern of the global coalition as it engages continuously with Iraq. And I want to pause for a moment on the word stabilization. Ambassador Bruce and I were just chatting about it. Stabilization means a lot of things to different people, whether you're in the military, the diplomatic, or the development community. And it can mean just staunching the bleeding to restoring essential services, to really trying to set the stage for a more inclusive government. And how we think about stabilization and what we do collectively as a global community about stabilization will absolutely set the stage for Iraq's future. So this is an important conversation, and it is about an important set of activities. I'm honored to have with us here today two guests who are steeped in these issues and both spent a great deal of time working on these issues. And they'll be able to talk about all these aspects of stabilization and how that truly matters to the United States, to the coalition, and most importantly to Iraq. A stable Iraq, a peaceful Iraq, has been the centerpiece of USIP's work since 2003. And I believe everybody here is familiar with USIP. We were founded in 1984 by the US Congress, dedicated to finding practical solutions for preventing and resolving violent conflict. And our current work in Iraq is really focused on consolidating the military gains in areas liberated from ISIS and setting the stage to avoid further cycles of conflict and a more peaceful future. And we do that by working with the National Network of Iraqi facilitators in places like Tikrit, Yathrib, Hawija, and different parts of Nineveh and elsewhere. We've worked over the past year with more than 100 shakes in and around the city of Hawija. And I'm very pleased to note that they recently formed a path-breaking pledge, these 100 leaders, to forego traditional justice mechanisms in pursuing their grievances and dealing with ISIS fighters and supporters. And instead, they pledged to use more state rule of law institutions. And a very important part of this agreement is that they agreed not to use women as part of the reparations process, which is an extraordinary and important development. And at the request of our Iraqi partners, we've taken steps to work with a variety of communities in and around Mosul to pursue reconciliation. And we see this as a critical part of the stabilization process. These are all efforts that are a very small part of what needs to be a global effort to adapt to the very rapidly changing realities on the ground right now. And these challenges underscore the importance of a global coalition with a shared vision and shared goals to ensure that we don't have to go and fight a third time. I think many of you are aware that senior members of the 72 member global coalition to defeat ISIS has been meeting here this week in Washington. They've had a number of sessions. And the participants included both of today's speakers, where they've been discussing the variety of challenges that face the coalition going forward. So I'm pleased to be able to introduce First Ambassador Eckhart Bross, who has graciously joined us here today. He's here in Washington for the coalition meetings. He is the German Foreign Office Special Envoy for Crisis Prevention and Stabilization. And importantly, he's the co-chair of the stabilization working group of the Global Coalition to Defeat ISIS. He was in Iraq, heading the German embassy until 2016 before serving as the Global Envoy and Special Envoy, and is a seasoned member of the diplomatic corps and a very, very deeply aware and engaged with these issues. He will be a lively discussant and we're delighted to have him here. Joseph Pennington has served as the Deputy Assistant Secretary of State for Iraq since December 2015. Das Pennington is equally steeped in these issues and brings his long experiences. He was previously the director of the Office of Iraq Affairs at the State Department, as well as the Council General in Erbil, and it has a long, distinguished diplomatic career. So these discussions will be moderated by the USIP's director of Middle East programs, Sarhan Hamasayid, who has worked on our Iraq programs for a number of years. He was in Baghdad in Erbil in May, and he's worked to ensure that the important insights from this visit and the lessons from the work on our ground are communicated to people here in our government. Das Pennington, I'm sure you've heard from us along the way, but I want to thank both of our speakers for being here with us today and everybody in the room. This is truly an important time, and this will be an important discussion. So we will have comments from our two speakers, and then we'll have a lively discussion and bring on all your questions and insights, because I know there's a lot of expertise here in the room. Thank you for joining us, and please welcome Ambassador Bross. President Lindberg, thank you very much for your gracious introduction. I was introduced as a lively discussant, so let's see where this leads us to. When Sarang and I met in Germany, I think it was in April, and we kind of mentally set this up, it wasn't clear that this was going to more or less coincide with the victory in Mosul, but it's a lucky coincidence, I must say. I discovered then in talking to Sarang that this institute has a strong emphasis, a strong focus, among other things, on Iraq, and I was, of course, pleased to discover that, but also in going through the brochures that institutes normally have to advertise themselves, I thought one particular headline sort of caught my attention, if peace is practical. I think that's a very good line. Peace is practical, it's no good dreaming about possible things to do, it's important to do things on the ground, because on the ground, you find out whether things work or they don't work. I will try not to say too much, because I'm looking forward to the discussion. I was told, as you said, it's going to be lively discussion, so let's, that there be lively discussion. I will say a few words about the victory, I will say a few words about tasks ahead, and I will point to two conclusions which also have relevance, I hope, and I think in the US, in the current US debate. The victory was bittersweet. I suppose most victories are sweet, and it's easy to point to the sweet aspects of it. The victory shows that the Iraqi security forces are a fighting force again, after the great debacle in the summer, exactly almost three years ago in the summer of 14, when thousands of people just fled and abandoned their weapons in the face of the onslaught of a few hundred ISIS fighters. This has strengthened and will strengthen Abadi, that's for sure, because he's invested a lot, sort of conceptually, mentally, politically, in money terms, in making ISF a fighting force again under his command. Another aspect is, I think, important, and that is that there's sufficient evidence to say, I believe, that these armed forces of Iraq took great care to spare civilians wherever this was possible. Now you may argue that so many civilians unfortunately died, and that would point in the opposite direction, but still I think we have enough evidence to say that wherever it was possible, in the face of an enemy that didn't spare civilians at all, but used them as human shields, wherever it was possible, the armed forces had it as uppermost in their mind, not to harm civilians in the fighting. And finally, I want to say that, as it has turned out, it's clear, I think, that the coalition proved an effective support for the Iraqi side. The bitter elements are also quite clear. The suffering is unimaginable, I think, for all of us who haven't been, thankfully, haven't been through this. The trauma, the suffering leaves in so many Iraqis, is also something which we cannot really grasp, which is no doubt there, and which will have its effect also into the future. The bitter argument about what comes after this victory is also part of the story of Iraq. Of course, there's a power struggle going on in and around Mosul, Nineveh. There is a power struggle going on in the whole country, and this will come more to the fore as elections of April 2018 approach. It's interestingly enough, but it's mostly an intra-shia power struggle. It's not so shia-suni, it's intra-shia, mostly, between sort of a Maliki at the one end and Sadrists on the other with Abadi in the middle. Finally, simply the material damage that has been done is colossal and makes the restart of life very difficult. This brings me to the tasks ahead, which I will enumerate. I could speak for as long as you like about each of these tasks, but I will not. We will have a discussion. So I will just mention, first of all, humanitarian help, which is an ongoing thing. There's nothing that just starts now. It's an ongoing thing, but it is the dimension surrounding Mosul on this humanitarian scale, absolutely unique. I mean, we have 900,000, more than 900,000 people that left this big city. It was a city of 2 million, I think. 900,000 people left, and it's an enormous achievement of the humanitarian organizations, largely of the UN, but also of others who participated, that I think we can say that all of these people were in some way or fashion careful. Nothing is ideal, obviously, in such a situation, but it could have been much, much worse. After that, it is essential to enable a restart, essentially to take these people to make them, put them in a position to come back to their city. But, I mean, with the turn of 900,000 people to the city of Mosul, imagine what an undertaking, in the face of the destruction. As I said, I mean, I think it's 15, 16 areas of the city are completely flattened, more or less. Others are heavily damaged, and some are only moderately damaged. So this is going to be an enormous undertaking. It takes time. However, stabilization, which is essentially this process of enabling the government to make IDPs return to the places they were driven from the IS. Stabilization is an ongoing business, just like humanitarian aid. It's an ongoing business in Iraq. It's not specific to Mosul. And one figure, which is perhaps not, to my taste at least, is not enough publicized, not enough well-known, is that 2 million Iraqis have already come back to their homes. 2 million IDPs have been able to resettle in their old cities and villages that they were driven from by the IS. We have about 3. something million still going around the country as IDPs. After stabilization comes, of course, reconstruction. Reconstruction in Iraq needs to be closely associated with reform. And reform in the economic sphere in particular means fighting corruption. The prime minister has said several times, and I think he's right, that corruption is just as much the enemy as the IS, and perhaps an even more difficult enemy. So fighting corruption is key, diversification of the economy and all the usual things that the IMF and the World Bank will tell you are also part and parcel of that reform package. Governance, decentralization, important topics, particularly also in the run-up to the elections. I had a meeting with the prime minister, Abadi, in May in which he started talking about decentralization, and he said something like, I have set off decentralization in Iraq as a political program. I know that this country doesn't like decentralization, and he's right. It's not something that comes naturally in that country, but I'm going to continue. So he's convinced, and I think rightly so, that this is the way to go. Fundamental transitional justice and a word which is often used, of course, reconciliation, are also issues that need attention. I've just enumerated the issues with a little bit of frill here and there, but one could go into each of these, of course. Let me come to these two conclusions, which are perhaps also designed to push into the debate then. One is I think we need to do everything to strengthen Iraqi unity and sense of identity in that situation that Iraq finds itself in at the moment. It's an existential struggle that the Iraqis and the Iraqi government and the whole country is going through. Kurdish independence and the referendum that's supposed to pave the way for that is a bad idea in that situation, and perhaps a bad idea at all, but it's certainly a bad idea in that situation. Another approach that would be not the right one, in my view, to strengthen Iraqi unity and identity would be figuratively speaking to see Iranian influence behind every bush in Iraq. Yes, Iran is influential in its neighboring country, Iraq. No doubt, there are links of history, there are links of geography, there are links of personal links. So it's clear when you are there, when you visit even the Iranian embassy in Baghdad, where the flag is as big as the whole wall here, there's a strong influence indeed when you think of the PMF, part of which are clearly under the influence of Iran. Still, the Iraqi government, the prime minister, and the Iraqis want to have their own country. They may not have a very pronounced pride in their own country, but I think through the military victories and so on, this has been growing and will grow. And we should enable them to do whatever we can to support this sense of pride and identity and not overplay the argument that we need to contain Iranian influence in that country. The second conclusion I want to draw is that I would say there's a danger of Iraq fatigue, perhaps also in this country, and perhaps particularly in this country, because you've invested a lot of money already in that country and it doesn't seem to have paid back so far. But I think it would be a grave mistake not to stay committed. Some people say it's a rich country. Yes, it may be potentially a rich country or it is potentially a rich country, but potentially it's not the same as actually being a rich country and having money to spend and having functioning infrastructure and having a functioning government. So the difference between potential and real needs to be bridged. And to cross that bridge, Iraq definitely needs our assistance. The U.S. government attitude, as far as we understand it, but we have more authoritative interpretation in a minute to come, the U.S. government's attitude to reconstruction at anything that goes beyond fixing the immediate is that perhaps it's not so much their job. I remember a headline which impressed me in the Huffington Post, which ran just an N and then like a whole row of O's. So no exclamation mark. And this was about reconstruction in Iraq. I think, frankly, it would be responsible to take that attitude for three reasons. First of all, from my German, my European perspective, the U.S. has a lot to answer for, namely for the situation that we have in Iraq. I think of 2003 and all that ensued. Not everything that's going badly in Iraq is, of course, immediately a consequence of U.S. action in 2003. But it's intrinsically linked and cannot be delinked from that. Secondly, the coalition, as I said at the outset, has been, I think, very successful in supporting the Iraqi government. And it has done that in a very measured and practical way. This is an achievement which one shouldn't endanger by letting Iraq fall into the abyss after it's been stabilized, basically. After, say, a year after the last city has been retaken from the airs, stabilization slowly peters out and then there's nothing. And finally, if geopolitical arguments have more of a pull in this audience, I don't know. But I mean, this would leave a vacuum if that happened. And who fills that vacuum? There are lots of options, but they're all bad. The IS might come back and fill it. Other extremist organizations might want to fill it. Iran might fill it. Russia might try to fill it. If you like any of those options, don't do reconstruction. Thank you. Good morning, everybody. Sarang Hamasaheed, I'm the director of Middle East program at USIP. I'll join the discussion later. And thank you, Ambassador Brossa, for those remarks. Now I would like to invite Deputy Assistant Secretary Mr. Joseph Pennington to the podium, please. Thank you very much, Sarang. Thank you, Nancy, for your kind introduction. Thank you, Ambassador Brossa, for your participation and those comprehensive remarks. I have the privilege of serving on the coalition stabilization working group, which is co-chaired by Ambassador Brossa. And this situation seems very familiar in that the ambassador has pretty much said what needs to be said, and that we go around the room and there's nothing left. But a few things, just a few thoughts that I would offer before we have a less formal chance for discussion. I endorse virtually everything that Ambassador Brossa has mentioned. I think it is always worth starting with the fact that the success that we have seen in Iraq on the military side, and we're starting to see on the stabilization side, and I'll get to some detail, is an Iraqi victory. This is something that was celebrated by all Iraqis this week when the announcement was made on July 10 that Mosul had in fact been liberated. We celebrate it as well, but this is more than anything, an Iraqi victory in a demonstration of Iraq's unity of purpose, determination, and frankly courage and willing to sacrifice to achieve this. It was done in a way that, and Ambassador touched on this as well, we heard in the stabilization discussions this week from our colleague from UNDP, Lise Grant, who I'm sure some of you know, has been involved in the planning for the humanitarian operation and leading the stabilization effort with the Iraqis, with strong coalition support and funding. And Lise said that in her 20-plus years in working in these kinds of situations, she has never seen a situation in which a country's military has incorporated humanitarian and has put civilians first, essentially, in the planning. There was a concept of operations, a con up, as they call it, that the Iraqi military worked out. And within that plan, there was built in the plan for care for the displaced through humanitarian assistance, and it developed then into the follow-on phase of stabilization, narrowly defined stabilization, which means for us getting displaced persons and displaced families back to their homes. And so that it was a unique, in her experience, effort on the part of a government to take care of its citizens in a very, very difficult wartime situation. Of course, because it was a difficult fight, particularly in West Mosul, which was expected, of course, there were many civilian casualties, and that's been pointed out in the reports that we have seen. But I think it is worth remembering that those responsible for those casualties in the overwhelming majority of cases was ISIS. And the way that they essentially held civilians as human shields and essentially hostages, and in fact shot and killed many as they were fleeing toward Iraqi forces. So it is a great moment for Iraq, but one that should not be enjoyed for too long, because the work really lies ahead. And first, I would point out that Mosul is a milestone in the military campaign. It's not the end of the military campaign. There are very significant tasks ahead for Iraqi security forces in places like Talafar, Hawija, Western Anbar, the border area, Al Qaim, and so on. So that fighting will go on. The coalition support will continue, and that was part of what the meetings were about this week, was to reinforce the coalition's determination to continue supporting our Iraqi partners, recognizing that the fight will go on. But at the same time, and just as importantly, the activity of stabilization narrowly defined, meaning taking liberated areas, getting basic infrastructure back up and running, getting hospitals and schools operating again, getting some basic economic activity going, clearing rubble from the streets, paying people to do that, getting some cash back into the economy and getting markets functioning once again, and also in some cases, implementing forms of community reconciliation, something that I know USIP and its partners in Iraq have been instrumental in doing and described the work that you're doing at Hawija. We've seen Spiker, we've seen a lot of, and we've heard feedback from Iraqis that this is in fact making a difference. How do you bring people back when there is suspicion, when there is potential for revenge, violence, and so on. Part of it is to have intermediaries like USIP and its partners that are involved in what we would consider part of stabilization. So that effort, which again, is carried out largely by UNDP on the ground, but funded from the coalition with an Iraqi lead. And again, I would stress this, not only on the military side, but on the humanitarian side, and on this stabilization effort, it's Iraqis that are driving the process. Our priorities on stabilization are set by the government of Iraq. And while we, as a coalition, as the United States, and as a coalition provide a great deal of support, I think we can't stress often enough that in fact, this is an Iraqi process, and we are supporting from very strongly behind them. So that's, and another part of the coalition meeting this week was to, frankly, make another appeal for our coalition partners to step up in funding, because the resource question looms large over stabilization efforts. UNDP laid out the numbers yesterday, and it's pretty daunting, but what is still needed for Mosul because of the level of destruction and the level of displacement. And so from the US side, we saw an announcement last week, we are putting another $150 million into the stabilization funds administered by UNDP on the humanitarian side, but we stepped up with another 119 million announced yesterday, because of course, even as we try to get communities back into liberated areas, there are 3 million plus displaced, and there will be additional displacements from those other areas that are still ahead of us. And so humanitarian work doesn't stop even with the Mosul victory. So those resource needs are going to be there, and that was again a part of the effort this week was to focus our partners on that, and I think that was the message got through, and we heard some very encouraging statements around the table this week about commitments to step up and do more. That is, of course, the stabilization narrowly defined, getting displaced people back to their homes. But of course, what we're really trying to get at is a larger issue, and the Ambassador alluded to this, the stabilization in the broader sense, stabilizing Iraq, moving toward a future of Iraq that is different from, not only different from what we've seen in the past three years, but different from pre-2014 as well. The goal is not to bring Iraq back to 2013, the goal is to use this moment to create a vision for a new Iraq, and of course it's up to Iraqis to decide what the specifics of that vision are, but I think we see a coalescence around some ideas, and I would agree that decentralization is, while it may not be an Iraqi tradition in the political culture, there is certainly support for having decision-making authority closer to local communities, and it's something, again, we support programmatically. USAID has put a lot of resources, technical assistance into helping the prime minister and his government start to implement decentralization, and there is some progress there. It's hard when there are limited resources because of an economic crisis, and the humanitarian crisis, and a war crisis. It's a difficult time to implement major reforms such as decentralization, but there has been a start, and that work will continue. There's also, of course, the larger question of political reconciliation, which feeds into the election process that we, in fact, we were already in, I think, in the minds of many Iraqi politicians, we're in the election season. Elections will likely be held in spring of 2018, and when you talk to Iraqis, they're very much focused on that process, and so it ties in with our narrow stabilization efforts to get the displaced back to their communities because then they are in a position to participate in the elections. We want to see a broad participation of Iraqis in the 2018 elections. There needs to be an effort to register those who are still displaced because displacements will continue well into next year, but the goal is to, within the next 12 months, to really start to get those numbers so there's still over three million to start sending those in the opposite direction and make some inroads before then. I will leave for the discussion. Some of the other points that the ambassador mentioned on Kurdish referendum, Iranian influence, we can certainly talk about that. I did want to make a comment on reconstruction, though, since it was raised. Reconstruction in Iraq, and you've probably seen estimates of what it's going to cost to rebuild or reconstruct Iraq, and of course it depends on what you mean by that, what number you come up with, but the numbers, whether it's 50 billion, 100 billion dollars, the numbers are staggering, and what I would say is that the numbers show very clearly that this is beyond the capacity of any one government or any group of governments working together, even the entire 72-member coalition, putting all of its resources into reconstruction, it would probably not make much of a dent. And so what we need to find, and again, Iraqis need to find, ways forward into reconstruction, recognizing that this is going to be a job of decades, but ways to bring in other actors when the private sector has to play the lead role in reconstruction, and we had a session at the chair by the World Bank the other day to talk about this, and the focus was very much on this point, on the need for economic reforms in Iraq to continue, and the government of Iraq has an agreement with the International Monetary Fund that is predicate, the financing predicated on serious economic reform. Those reforms are ongoing, the Iraqis need to create better conditions on the ground so that international companies can work and make profit and be assured that their interests will be protected as they do business in Iraq, and so creating a better business environment. These are keys to unlocking some of that private sector activity. So I think, yes, governments need to be supportive, and of course there will be a debate, and it's got a political dimension, and Congress has a say in our budget process as to where we go on that issue, but Secretary Tillerson was pretty clear back in March when we convened the last ministerial of the coalition that the United States is not returning to a nation building mode, and so I think we need to be realistic about what the United States government and other governments can contribute to that process, but we are certainly, we'll remain engaged in Iraq, broadly speaking, we will see through our efforts on stabilization, and we will certainly support Iraqi reforms that will unlock the forces that can really deal with the longer term reconstruction issues. Maybe I'll stop there, and we could move to a less formal setting. Morning again, it is absolutely my honor to share the stage with you gentlemen. I had the pleasure of discussing Iraq and the issue of stabilization with you in many meetings, and this is a topic that I know has evolved since the early days of the coalition, and some of the things, I think you got to some of the elements that I was going to ask about, which is how do we define stabilization, and I think the two modes that you highlighted, the narrow mode and the more expanded, gets to some of the questions that was a gap in what stabilization meant to different people. Some people equate stabilization with the whole issue of fixing Iraq's governance issues, and in that sense, and there's a larger question of political reconciliation, how, if this is not part of the mission of the coalition to work on this, and whose mission is it, and how do the issues related to governance will be addressed so that we do not get back to where we are today, because we had these territories in the past, the Iraqi army was in Mosul, and it was governance for many people that got us into this place. ISIS, as much as being said about being a foreign fighters coming to Iraq, but it had a local ground on which it survived and flourished. So this broader question of stabilization, as you see the mission of the coalition in the next chapter and the military winding down, where does, and if I put the question to you first, Ambassador Brasov, where do you see the national reconciliation and the bigger question of governance in relation to the mission of the coalition? Thank you for a very difficult question. Stabilization is a term which is used, is like a household term, I mean it's like, I don't wanna say it's like motherhood and apple pie, but it's what you use also in all sorts of contexts. That's why I think it is useful to make a distinction between stabilization as we use it in everyday life and stabilization as we discuss it here in this context. Because if a term gets sort of too big, it covers everything and it gets meaningless. Stabilization as we have not only defined it but worked on it in the context of Iraq has been very narrowly or relatively narrowly defined as Joe Pennington put it, essentially helping the government of Iraq in any kind of actions and policies designed to return IDPs to the liberated areas. The point of that type of stabilization work is always the same, it's a political point, it's not an economic measure, it's not something convenient, it's not something designed to help the people, although it eventually will, but it's not designed to help necessarily the people, that's humanitarian aid. But it's designed to give some political breathing space, some room of maneuver to a legitimate government, in this case. And this is perhaps the point also to underline here, we have in Iraq, in great contrast, for example, to Syria and other places, a bit more touchy, that Syria certainly, we have a legitimate government, which is democratically elected. And we want that government to survive, and we want that government to look good and to build trust and be able to build trust with its own people, and that's why we support these aspects that I mentioned, and that is what stabilization is. Now, how does that relate to governance in general and reconciliation is your question. Essentially, the question of reconciliation is in the hands of the Iraqis, and the primary agent that will help them, is trying to help them is Yunami, the UN mission. Jan Kubisch, the head of that mission, spends virtually all these day and some of his nights trying to push forward on reconciliation, but always keeping wisely in the background, not saying, ah, I'll invite for big meeting, big round table on reconciliation, because I mean these initiatives that have also existed in the past have always failed. And another word on reconciliation, which is sort of really my experience of these two years from 14 to 16, was very strongly that rather than talking about reconciliation, let's get some things going on the ground which have a reconciliation effect. IDP return is such a practical thing, because if IDPs return, what does it mean? It means, for example, PMF, Shia PMF, let's say, have liberated a territory. Policemen come in to secure the area. They may be local policemen, so there's already some cooperation there. Then the population comes back, they probably come from Dahuk or somewhere, Kurdish area, so there's a link there with the Kurdish region. For all of that to come together, that is already this together, this has already a reconciliatory effect. And there are more such examples, I don't want to go on and on, but it's more that type of thing that I think has a good prospect of bringing about reconciliation in the longer term in Iraq than the big round table conference where things are exchanged. I will stop here because otherwise I could go on the governance, but I will stop here. Well, thank you, if I may put the same question to you, Mr. Pennington, and probably elaborate from some of the things, some of the meetings we had in Baghdad. In one of the takeaways from across the board, I mean, in our visit with our Vice President, Mike Gaffey, to Baghdad in April and May, we met with about 200 people from the top leadership to the community level in individual or in group settings. And there is a high expectation that the United States, more than the coalition, will come back to Iraq with a big military footprint and there will be mega projects through big U.S. companies. There's just especially among the Sunni community. So there's that strong high expectation, there's a strong desire for the U.S. to play a bigger role. They say this governance question will not be, the Iraqis on their own will not be able to push it forward without an external help. Obviously, external help, people define it as they, most define it as the United States, but other countries as well. How do we go about this managing this chapter? If we want this political process to go forward, the U.S. is much in demand for a leading role. How can we go about this next chapter? Yeah, well, of course, it's something that we hear from all of our interlocutors in Iraq as well. And I think the first part of our response is always to temper expectations. We believe, first of all, that it's simply not realistic to expect a major ramp up in U.S. presence in Iraq. It's not something that the political climate will accommodate in Iraq. And it's not something that there's any appetite for here in Washington. It's not to say we won't have a presence, but the idea that there will be a massive influx of American forces is simply not realistic. And so we need to be very upfront. We are very upfront with our Iraqi friends about that. These are, at bottom, the factors that played in the rise of ISIS in Iraq, and there were many, and still debatable, which played the largest role. These are Iraqi challenges, and they've been there for many years. And Iraqi challenges are not going to be met by American solutions. And it doesn't mean, again, that we want to disengage from the process. We want to be at the table. If those in the room want us at the table, we want to bring people together from the various elements, various communities, in Iraq. But this is not an American, there is no American plan for Iraq, is another phrase that we hear. What is the plan? The plan is the plan that the Iraqis are going to develop by speaking to one another, by negotiating, by expressing their voices through the political process, and through reconciliation, and Yunami is playing the lead role in that. The United States is ready to be helpful where we can, but the United States is not going to design, there's no new blueprint for Iraq that's coming out of Washington. Not only because we don't have the bandwidths and the capacity for it, but because it won't be effective. We've learned some lessons from the past here. An American design for Iraq is not the answer. And so I think once we get beyond that stage of our conversations, and we usually can, that we can have a real talk about what is realistic for Iraq going forward from an Iraqi point of view. Of course, we have American values and American perspective on issues in Iraq and developments in Iraq, and we have a long history there. But this is an Iraqi set of issues that requires Iraqis to sort it out. Thank you. I have a follow-up question, Ambassador for both of you, and then I'll open it up to the questions from the audience. But a follow-up question to that is that if, I think the US position has been clear, the coalition has been trying to also manage expectations, but there is a gap. The gap, if you look at the reality, I think you both mentioned different aspects of it, that one is the volume of the problems is so big that even all the efforts of the coalition, the Iraqi effort will not be sufficient to address all the problems. So, and then there is the vacuum that Ambassador Borussia, you spoke about and how Iran, Russia, and others may come in to fill those vacuums. Then, in this gap between where the reality of the situation is, where the resources and the abilities and the willingness of the Iraqi leadership and the United States and the coalition are, how do we manage this gap where it does not lead to a bigger problem that we have currently? And I would doubt I can come back to you, Ambassador, because you had a follow-up also. Thank you. I wanted to say, first of all, Joe Pennington and I are very much on the same page, really, I mean, everything you said about ownership and the importance of ownership, is very much the right approach also from our perspective. And that was the case throughout the two years that I spent in Baghdad and where there was very close links and cooperation with the U.S. embassy and Stuart Jones was the American ambassador at the time. And again, I mean, I was very much singing from the same page, which is always helpful, of course, in a situation of crisis like that. But trying to address your question and also partly answering the government's question, I believe that while we need to respect ownership of the Iraqi government and the elite and the population as well, I would link, I would try to link governance as closely as possible to economic development because there are many overlaps. You cannot have a good economic development in Iraq without addressing the political question of decentralization. Most of the oil is down in Basra. It needs to be, the revenue of that oil needs to be distributed somehow. And there you are already on the financial side of decentralization. Somehow it needs to be organized. So you need to find governance there. I mentioned the important role for the economic development that fighting corruption will have. Corruption and governance are closely linked in many cases. So you have from coming, if you come by the economic angle at these questions, you're not confronting the Iraqi side with a blueprint that we don't want to present neither the US nor Germany nor the coalition of this is how you need to do it. You tell them, okay, I mean, but how are you gonna deal with oil revenues? Find an answer, give us an idea. And then normally, I mean, there's some give and take and some experts that can advise and so on. And that's the way, I think that's a more promising way to get at the question of governance. The gap that exists between, that necessarily now exists between putting a country like Iraq on a good road again after such a tremendous, we heart-venturingly tremendously really conflict. There's so many wounds still there and still fresh. And the real possibilities that we have to support that process and the possibilities, the limited possibilities that the government has to run that process. That gap is dangerous, no doubt. It cannot be bridged as Joe said as well by us getting together hundreds of billions. This is not gonna happen and the Iraqi government understands it. I believe what matters in those situations is not that you bridge the gap instantaneously, that's impossible, but to give the population at large a good sense that things are moving in the right direction. It's that move in the right direction, even if the situation is terrible, even if your house is burnt down or flattened, you need to have hope and hope can become, if you have that feeling that things are moving in the right direction, even from small beginnings. So I believe somehow it sounds a bit banal, but that is the answer in that situation. Yeah, just a couple of very brief comments to add on. And I think I emphasized in my comments that the United States is not going to determine Iraq's future, but I also want to be clear, the United States is gonna remain engaged in Iraq. And so that's the next phase of that conversation. We'll remain engaged on economic reform. We will, if economic reform succeeds, I am absolutely confident that the American private sector will step up to opportunities that are in Iraq. We've seen some of that already with discussions of the Baghdad-Aman Highway that I'm sure you're familiar with. There will, if the governance issue can be sorted out, and it's a huge task, but one step at a time, there will be support across the board. We will remain engaged. We wanted to also point out another aspect of our policy I think that has been sometimes overlooked, and that is the need in our view to reconnect and reintegrate Iraq back within its region. And that's why we think that the visits that we've seen between governments of Iraq and Saudi Arabia over the past six months are important, not only because Iraq has a certain role to play in the region, could in the future play a stabilizing role, but also because it gives Iraqi foreign policy options and balance. And that's where we get to the Iranian influence that obviously from Washington's perspective should be limited. Iran and Iraq are neighbors, that's not gonna change, but Iraq, if there is more balance in its foreign relations, that helps to offset the Iranian influence. The other thing that will offset Iranian influence is successful institution building in Iraq. Stronger Iraqi institutions mean less Iranian influence. Iranians look for opportunities, they look for vacuums, and if we can working together contribute to the strengthening of Iraqi institutions, the Iraqis themselves have shown they will push back against the Iranian influence. I've never met any Iraqi who wants to be ruled from Tehran, Iraqis have their own sense of identity that will, in my view, assert itself over time if we can keep the other factors heading in the right direction. Thank you. On that, I would like to open it up to questions. We have Mike Kremers on both sides, and I'll take one question from the back, yes, all the way back, and then next question here. Hi, my name is Najmabi Sardar, I'd like to thank you for your comments today. My question is to the ambassador, you mentioned that the Iraqi government was in favor of decentralization, but don't you think that along with weak governors is what allowed ISIS to flourish in the first place and will let other actors such as Iran take a bigger role as well? But you expected it more than that, I suppose. What made ISIS flourish in the first place? Was a policy driven by the Maliki government that was not inclusive, that excluded large chunks of the population, in particular the Sunni part of the population. That in combination with a situation after 2003 were in particular the army being mostly Sunni and certainly Sunni-led was dissolved, where many civil servants had to leave their job, were not recompensed in any practical manner, were losing their household, their houses, their property. All of that led over a longer period of time to a situation where large chunks of the population and many of them lived in Mosul, actually, where it became very disaffected of the Iraqi government. It is no coincidence that many military leaders of the Saddam Hussein time had their home, town in Mosul. And that Mosul, therefore, was the point where ISIS found it particularly convenient to find the first breach in Iraq and get in from there. Those were, I mean, one can go on and on about it, but just to give you an idea, those are the real reasons, not decentralization or anything closely associated with that. Thank you, and thank you so much for keeping the question a question and keeping it brief. And that's what I would like to ask or other colleagues who will ask that you keep it to introduce yourself and also keep it to a question. Yes. Thank you, Kaksar Hanke. Niyaz Barzani from Karate Office in D.C. My question is both to both Mr. Pennington and Ambassador Bruce. What would it take for the U.S. and Germany to realize that one Iraq policy is a failed policy and it won't be successful? When we look at the history of Iraq, we can't find any extended period of stability and prosperity. Why we incur the sun? As course should pay the price for the rivalry between Shia and Sunnis, why should we repeat the same mistakes? And Mr. Ambassador, you just mentioned that Maliki was one of the reasons that led to the rise of ISIS. How can you guarantee us as Kurds that there won't be another Maliki in future? And I want to end on a personal note that you said Kurdish independence is a bad idea. Why it's not a bad idea to have 200 nations independent in the world, but it's a bad idea to have one independent Kurdistan. I was born in a refugee camp during the Iran-Iraq war and in one day, July 31st of July 1984, 8,000 people of my tribe, the Barzani tribe were arrested and we never heard that from any of them. They were all killed. So just to let you know, of course you are free, you are entitled to your opinion, but I can guarantee you no one or no argument can convince me or the other 5 million Kurds in Kurdistan that Kurdish independence is a bad idea. Thank you. Thank you. You want to address? Sure. Thank you for the question. I, as was mentioned in the introduction, I spent two years in Erbil from 2013 to 2015 as the head of our consulate there and so I count many officials in the KRG as friends and good colleagues, good partners. They have certainly, the Kurdistan region and the Peshmerga have certainly stepped up in a very significant way and are a key factor in pushing back and pushing out ISIS. And so I have just wanted to start by saying I have tremendous respect, admiration for and affection for the people of that region. What we were talking about and I think what the ambassador was alluding to was a narrower question than the broader question of the legitimacy of independence aspirations. What we are focused on is the need for Iraqis from all communities at this time to maintain the focus where we think it needs to be, which is on finishing the job against ISIS, getting IDPs back to their homes, dealing with an economic crisis that is every bit as real in Erbil as it is and Sulaimaniyah as it is in Baghdad. And reforming and strengthening government institutions, democratic institutions. And that in our view calls for greater unity, not fragmentation. And so we think the timing of the referendum that has been announced is not conducive to stabilizing Iraq, which is the subject of the conversation today. So we do not support having a referendum, certainly not at this time. What we would like to see is for our friends in the Kurdistan region to engage with the government of Iraq. And I think there needs to be a dialogue that leads to a real exchange and a real way forward in Baghdad-Erbil relations. We the United States are certainly willing and ready to participate in that discussion with Baghdad and Erbil on the future relationship. But we think now is not the time to raise those divisive issues that especially as we head into an election campaign will polarize the political debate and political discussion and push Iraqis apart when they need to be coming together. I come up from a country, Germany, that has found its unity and you want to its happiness through self-determination. So Germans per se cannot be against self-determination, I think. Also we have tens of thousands of Kurds living in Germany. We have a popular feeling of sympathy and understanding with the Kurds, even admiration with the Peshmerga, a slightly idealized picture of them, but all of that exists in Germany. Also, it is much valued from our perspective that the Kurdish region took more than a million refugees, IDPs from within the country, not asking whether they're Shia, Sunni, Kurds, Arabs, what else. All of that finds admiration, respect and support in Germany. And you will recall that Germany supported the Kurdish government and in particular also in military terms, strongly. Some of the weapons which we provided to the Kurdish region via Baghdad and with the consent of the government of Iraq were in fact instrumental in fighting back ISIS. And I'm told that some people in Kurdistan even give the name Milan, which is the name of that weapon, as a first name to their children, at least. Why is our attitude, nevertheless, as it is, namely critical towards the independence referendum, but also beyond that towards the idea of Kurdish independence in that context that we have now? When you look at German unification, this happened and was able to happen because we were in close harmony and coordination with all our neighbors. And every neighbor eventually agreed that that would be a reasonable idea and that Germany, a reunited Germany, would not be seen as a danger to them or to their interests and so on. Look at the situation in the region we're talking about where Turkey has already come out quite clearly saying no. Iran has also come out quite clearly saying no. The most important argument to me personally, and I think also to our government, is this. If you take Iraq, if you take the Kurdish region out of the Iraqi equation, what I would predict with almost certainty is a ferocious conflict between Shia and Sunni in what remains of Iraq, a bloody conflict. If this prediction is only halfway through, it is a way we as government do not want to support and cannot condone. Thank you. So we have about seven minutes in our time and I'll probably take the three questions in one round so that we get to as many of them as possible. So gentlemen here first. Yeah, I'm Will Imbrie from Dinkorp International. Joe, the quantity of mines and IEDs and explosive remnants of war in Mosul in the area must be just overwhelming. Clearing those seems to stand in the way of doing all the other post reconstruction jobs that you all laid out this morning. Could you tell me a little bit about what the US government is gonna do to try to help the Iraqis? You certainly can't do this themselves. A state gonna do it, DOD, UN, Halo Trust or other organizations. How are you gonna approach them? Thank you. Next question here. Good morning. Thank you gentlemen for enlightening us on this particular issue which is very important for Iraq. I come from Iraq myself. My name is Joseph Kasab. I am the president of the Iraqi Christians Advocacy and Empowerment Institute. We've been doing a lot of work for Iraq and with the Iraqis for more than three decades. I just want to touch on two issues related to the stabilization which we are working on with many authorities. The question is, first of all, is about the stability in Iraq. I'm not sure a lot of people know that if ISIS left Iraq, that doesn't mean their ideology has left. And therefore, a lot of people that have been talking to us and telling us, especially among the IDP communities, that they are unable to go back because there's nothing left for them. Number one, number two, the ideology is still there. That's number one. Number two is the security issue. Das Pennington spoke about the security issue and if we provide security people will be able the private sector can work in Iraq. This is security never been provided since 2003. We've been in Iraq more than 20 times and we've never seen a security provided by the Iraqis for the Iraqis themselves. Even the US was not able to do a lot. And as a matter of fact, the question is, are Americans, the US, going to provide security in Iraq? Because Iraqis themselves are unable to provide it. Okay, thank you. Thank you for your time. My name is Salam Ily from the International Foundation for Electoral Systems. My question is about the economy. And I know you mentioned that the US does not have a long-term plan for military existence or taking a lead role, but the American administration has a lot of economic orientation or priorities. And we know how much it's important for Iraqi youth to have jobs and that would keep them away from being involved in extremism and joining extreme groups. So is there an American or European priorities or a plan to help and support Iraqi economic reforms? You mentioned that Iraqis need to figure out ways to help fixing the legislations and laws related to investment so that big companies and firms can come into Iraq and start operating. So is there any plan to support Iraqi policymakers in that regard? Thank you. And I cannot not squeeze a question from Iraq's Maestro, Iraqi orchestra. Mr. Karim also please, the question here. Thank you very much. It's great to see neighbors instead of meeting in Baghdad and meeting in DC. Good to see you Ambassador. In relevance to civilization, the countries of the coalition, how much has done towards the preventative approach of dealing with ISIS in the countries of the coalition versus just the impact of such actions in Iraq, hoping that it's really after ISIS because this is a things, an ongoing problem still, ideologically and maybe as in function as well. So how much, how are the countries of the coalition dealing with possible links with what ISIS was or still is in Iraq and relevance to other countries where ISIS, as in Tunisia, as in Algeria, I don't want to name countries that doesn't get very politicized. The problem is global, it's not limited to Iraq. Thank you, great question. Joe, you wanna start with a security and mining question? Sure. The answer on, I mean, it's a great point and in fact I should have mentioned it in my remarks on stabilization. The issue of unexploded ordnance and mines and booby traps that ISIS has strategically left all across cities that it has vacated or been defeated in is a major problem, challenge to stabilization. You can't get people to return if it's not safe for them to return. And so the United States has funded a contract with a private U.S. company called Janus that has been working in Anbar and is on the ground, I believe, already in East Mosul and will work in Mosul as well. There's also a U.N. effort under Unmass, the mine, that portion of the U.N. that deals with this issue. And so it depends on the place. In Fallujah it was not a problem because civilians stayed in Fallujah till the pretty much the end and they came out so there wasn't time simply for ISIS to do what it would want to do and jeopardize civilian returns by placing those traps. In Ramadi, completely different sort of, Ramadi was the worst of the worst in terms of the need for demining and to deal with these unexploded ordnance. So, and it took months and months and months and months that delayed returns to Ramadi. In East Mosul, so far so good. You don't know what the level of contamination is until you actually get into these areas. In East Mosul, in many of the areas, ISIS for whatever reason was not able or didn't contaminate to a great extent. We're gonna have to wait and see in West Mosul. Of course, the fear is first there's a significant, a significantly higher level of destruction and our guess is that there is perhaps a higher level of contamination. So it is a, it certainly will be an issue in Mosul. How much of an issue we don't know yet, but we think we're in a pretty well-prepared to deal with it. But it is a precondition for everything else, all the other aspects of stabilization. And I think in the earlier remarks, you sort of answered the question, will the U.S. provide security? And if you have anything on the ideology question. Right, and so, and we should have actually there's another element of stabilization. You can't, again, people won't go back if there's not security. We found the first, sort of the testing ground for the stabilization model of UNDP was in Tikrit. And we started working on the kinds of stabilization programs that we described this morning and people weren't going back. And the reason they weren't going back is because there was nobody in charge of security on the ground that was trusted by the local community. And so the challenge is to change that dynamic to get the right mix of forces on the ground that give people confidence. And once that happened in Tikrit, the floodgates were open and people went back en masse. And so that, again, demining is one precondition, security is another precondition. I know in the Ninoa Plains, the areas that I know you're concerned about, Joe, that we're not there yet. I'm gonna be very honest. There needs to be a lot more done to sort out the security issues. And it's complex. There are a lot of groups on the ground. There is the issue of who controls what, whether it's the KR, it's behind Peshmerga lines, it's in front of Peshmerga lines, controlled by the government of Iraq. There are various security actors involved, some of which are problematic. And so there's a lot that still needs to be sorted out. But we certainly recognize the challenge there. It's going to take time. But it is well understood that people will not go back and should not go back until they can be sure that their community is gonna be secure. Thank you, Joe. Speaking of explosives and improvised explosive devices, I usually also talk about as a barrier of the return, the revenge, and the seeds of division that ISIS left behind. And I see them as somewhat of a social improvised explosive devices that ISIS planted so that they will continue division the community and the peace will not prevail. And that means they can survive in that environment more. Ambassador, you have the economic question and on the other questions if you wanna weigh in. Okay, if you allow me, I'll take the other two questions of the economy. And the global approach. Is there a plan to support? I think there is not a plan, the one plan to support, but there is a common realization on the part of the members of the coalition. As Joe has put it, that the private sector will have to play an important part. If that cannot be harnessed to Iraqi reconstruction development, it will fail, I'm sure. So there's not many alternatives. That's the way to go. And the conditions for the private sector and the Prime Minister agrees with that. That's also important to say the Prime Minister agrees with that. In fact, in my last meeting, that was the first thing he said to me. I know we have to get the private sector in. That was the first sentence before he said hello almost. So, but he knows and we know, I think, how difficult that's gonna be to create conditions where the private sector wants to come in because you cannot force them in. And I repeat what I said before, corruption is the main hindrance. Throughout my two years there in Iraq, every week we had major issues with German firms that were, had been, were, or were going to be active in Iraq, complaining about instances of corruption would be summarizing what they complained about, that they hadn't been getting their money or that some things were being asked for them that hadn't been agreed really and so on and so forth. As long as that's the case, I mean these firms talk to other firms and tell them, well, you better go to Vietnam than there. And I always keep on telling this to the Iraqi side. I mean, this is the reality. We do not steer where they go, you have to do something about it. So fighting corruption is absolutely of the essence and we have certain ideas of how to do that. We have a big loan program of half a billion euros which we accompany with consulting. And this consulting effort is paid by us, not by the Iraqi side, it's paid by us in order to devise ways how to spend half a billion euros on projects in Iraq without corruption. We don't quite say that openly, but that's the case, that's the ultimate essence of why we have this consultancy. The jury is still out as to whether this will work, but I've always telling the Iraqi side that if it's not working, the program is finished. I think one has to be pretty tough on that point. The question about the preventative approach more globally, I mean, not just Iraq and Syria which is at the center of the coalition activity. Yes, I think it's quite clear that the coalition is in a sense moving in that way. If you look at the meetings we've had this week, there were, we had, for example, the African, some African four, five African countries in to discuss Boko Haram and the Chad Lake, Lake Chad region and the security challenges there. So there is a certain move in that direction, Indonesia was mentioned, yes. There is also a certain logic stemming from the matter of things because if you discuss, for example, how to counter messaging of the IS, this is by definition a global affair nowadays. You don't do messaging in a certain country, in a certain continent, you do it globally on the internet. If you discuss financial resources, they are, they travel the world, they're not focused on a certain area. So you need to, if you want to be effective, you need to have the whole world basically on your map. Having said that, I also want to be honest and say that Germany and other countries are a little bit, I mean, this is an ongoing development. This is not, there hasn't been a decision to, I don't know, globalize a coalition or something. It's just an ongoing development. And so in that, within that ongoing development, the German position is a little bit circumspect, shall we say, because we figure that Iraq and Syria are at the center of really fighting ISIS. It's true that ISIS may also rear its head in other places, but at the center of it is still the geographical presence of ISIS in Iraq and Syria. And it's not finished yet. It's not finished yet. We need to remember that. And therefore we would advocate to keep, as we say, the eyes, both eyes on the ball really, not stray across the whole world and say, ah, we need to do something there and there and there and lose out of sight the immediate things that are at hand. And I think the immediate things are in Iraq and Syria still. So we want the emphasis to stay there. We think the job isn't done there. The attention, the focus of the coalition needs to remain there, at least for the foreseeable future, so that the job can be done and can be finished and brought to a good end, we hope. If I may, now diverting a little bit from the script here, since in the course of this meeting, I discovered my good friend, Karim Wasfi here in the audience. I didn't know he was going to be here. That was our surprise for you. It definitely was, because I was sitting with my back to him. We planned it. I know you plan all these things. But I want to share with the audience something which is looking back at my time in Iraq will always be dear and close to my heart. And that is that in close cooperation with Karim Wasfi, who's not only the maestro of the orchestra, but he's also a cello player level. In close cooperation with him, we organised a concert. Karim Wasfi and a young German pianist, Florent Heinisch, in the German Embassy took about a year to organise that, just to give you an idea how difficult it is to organise such things in Iraq. Took about a year to organise that and a good bit of the problems were my ministry at home and security and all the rest of it. But we managed, we had the concert and I think it was a great triumph in many ways. Triumph in the sense that this concert was symbolic for, in a sense that it showed the possibilities of beauty, of culture in an environment which was the opposite, which was violence, chaos, human rights abuses, you name it. But we were able to have this little island of peace and harmony and people understood each other on a different level, which was beyond just words, it was magic. I want to use that occasion discovering you here in the audience to thank you once again for all you did to make that possible. Thank you Ambassador. And actually just to flag one quickly, he played the cello right after the Karada explosion which was one of the bloodiest explosions in Baghdad that killed over 200 people at the ruins of the explosion in Karada and that was a very powerful message as the life continues. And there are Iraqi leaders in the different spaces of the Iraqi spectrum in politics, in culture, in community that are fighting for life and they want to continue life. And you made my conclusion easier Ambassador by stressing the need to continue Iraq. This was a fascinating discussion on stabilization. This conversation will continue. We would look forward to future opportunities to host you here to continue this discussion and I would like to thank the audience for being here with us, those who watched us online and please join me in a round of applause to our speakers. Thank you so much.