 I'm vice president for research and programs here at CSIS. The topic today is security in the Mediterranean. We're honored to have General Jim Jones here. After General Jones speaks, he'll have a conversation with Steve Flanagan, who's our senior vice president and Kissinger chair and our resident NATO expert, and John Alterman, who's our director of our Middle East program. To introduce General Jones, we're honored to have Admiral Guido Ventaroni. He is served at the highest levels of the Italian Armed Services and NATO. And he's currently served on FinMechanica's board. We're grateful for FinMechanica to making this possible today. Admiral? Ladies and gentlemen, welcome. I have the honor today to introduce a man who actually does not need any introduction. But having asked to do that, I'm very pleased to do. Very pleased because I've known General Jones and I appreciate his high qualities. I must say the subject of this panel is the Mediterranean. I think you can understand that being from Italy, having spent most of my life as sailor in the waters of the Mediterranean and being a flyer of course, flying above those waters, I am particularly interested on what we are going to listen today. In all my career, I've tried to emphasize the importance of the Mediterranean. Now I think that it is clear to many because we have all those instabilities within the Mediterranean. But in the past, it was considered, especially during the Cold War, was considered a kind of marginal theater. Actually, it has never been a marginal theater. You may remember that we have the long-standing, Middle East problems, Arab, Israel, Palestinian problem and so forth. And of course, during the Cold War, the Mediterranean was in the Mediterranean, we had the deployment of the sixth fleet, which was a very important asset for NATO and the alliance as a whole. So for me, the Mediterranean has always been important. And today, we will have an update on this importance, I think. But let me now say a few words about General Jones. I am a military. I've spent most of my life in the military. So when I look at a colleague or, let's say, curriculum, I start from the beginning because the starting point is, in my view, the most important one. Now, General Jones started as Marine Corps officer, Second Lieutenant, I think, in 1967. He was commissioned. He went through the course. And then he was deployed in Vietnam right away. And in Vietnam, he had what we call the baptism of fire. Now, if there is something that reveals the stature and the nature of a man, his combat. And he went into combat right away. And he was decorated twice for gallantry. And of course, he was promoted. And he was platoon commander, company commander. Now, nothing enhances the natural leadership and command capabilities of a man by commanding the soldiers on the feet. But the soldiers that you see every day, every day. And you share with them hardship and dangers. So the starting point was the right one to highlight his qualities and his nature. And then let me jump to the late stage of his career. I had just left NATO and had retired. I had been chairman of the NATO Military Committee. When he became, when General Jones became Supreme Allied Commander Europe and Commander of US forces in Europe. And when he took his post, he wanted to do something that was very unusual. Had been no one had done that. He wanted to create a group of mentors to assist him the best way possible. Because NATO was in a transitional phase. And so he wanted me to join this mentors group. So I was associated with him in the years 2005, 2006. And I knew that he did not need any mentors. But I was, I deeply appreciated this type of approach to his new responsibilities. I'm grateful to him. Of course, I told him after a while that he could just walk on his feet. And of course, this was well known to me even before. So thank you very much, Jim, for what you have done for your country, of course. But also for the NATO Alliance, to which I have belonged all my life. And let me say two things that make us even closer. First, he has nine grandchildren. And me, too. This is the first thing. And you will learn that if you watch carefully as a grandfather, you can watch what the children do as they grow up. As parents, you normally overlook this. And if you look carefully to the children while they grow up, you will understand the world. How mankind, how humanity is made. Because their nature is evident since they are born. The second point is that we have both been basketball player. Now, do not laugh. If he stands up, you can understand he, of course, is a national basketball player. But of course, I'm a little bit older. And the average tetra at my time was a little bit less. But nevertheless, I am short anyway. I cannot hide this. But I was a good play baker. I was a driver. I was, of course, played in the Italian Neville Academy, a basket team, basketball team. And I loved it. And this is the second sport and family. And with this, I think I can conclude wishing you the best luck for the future. Thank you very much. Admiral, thank you very much for that very kind introduction. And thank you for the human touch. You put on it at the end. You know, everything's relative. The other day, I met Karim Abdul-Jabbar for the first time. And I was kind of looking up like that. So I totally understand the fact is that sports plays an important part in our development. And I certainly appreciated my days on the field. Ladies and gentlemen, I'm happy to be here. I'm going to talk a little bit about a part of the world that is still very strategically important. It's an area that sometimes we've taken for granted. As the Admiral said, it's strategically important, although we haven't always realized it to its full extent. And then we're going to have some panel discussion and then some Qs and As. And on the questions and answers, I remember once when I was coming out of the Marine Corps lecturing at the Marine Corps Command and Staff College, a school just down the road here at Quanticove, mostly majors and Lieutenant-Colonels. So I finished my remarks, threw it open for questions, and this immediately, the spring butt of the class jumped up and asked a very tough question. And I really didn't want to take it on. So I kind of waffled it a little bit and went on to another question. And I could tell by his expression that he wasn't thrilled with my answer. So he raised his hand again, acknowledged him again. He rephrased the question. Again, I gave him a soft answer. And it just went on like this for a third time as well. And finally, when he posed this question a third time, I said, you know, Major, are you really asking a very difficult question here? And he said, well, you know, General, I'm sure you didn't get to be a general by asking easy questions when you were in this class. And I said, no, but it helped me make Lieutenant Colonel. So the Mediterranean in the 20th century is obviously known to a lot of us. If you look during the Cold War, if you look at the evolution of not only the NATO commands, but also the US-European command, the US-European command was a name that was I never really thought about until I became the US-European commander. And I looked at what my responsibilities were, and most of them were African. If you counted up the countries, most of the countries in the US-European command were African. And I've always thought that we, the United States, has had a very strong and well-developed east-west orientation in its efforts and its dialogue. And we have omitted many times our attention in our own hemisphere and almost totally omitted focusing on the importance of Africa. And so I was happy to be at the forefront of the discussion that led to the creation of AFRICOM during my watch. And the only thing that saddens me is that AFRICOM is in Germany. It would be a lot better, I think, if it was in Africa. But when you go around advertising a unified command as a combatant command, what head of state and his right mind is going to say, oh yeah, you could put a combatant command in my country. So I prefer titles like Unified Command. I prefer taking these very, very important commands and making them more user-friendly. That is more representative of the whole of government, which is part of the global development topic that we discussed earlier at CSIS. But for the most part, the Mediterranean has really been a focus of ours that has largely been on the northern rim of the Mediterranean, having been a six-fleet marine sailor many times. Most of the times when we pulled into port or did any operations, it was always on the northern rim. The Liberty ports in the spring in the Mediterranean were usually Marseille, Khan, Mallorca, Turkey, Israel. Very few times did we actually visit southern rim ports. But the strategic importance of the Mediterranean and its choke points, starting with Gibraltar and going on to all the way up into the Black Sea through the Suez Canal, continues to be, I think, one of the areas of the world that we have to pay attention to. And obviously, in light of what's going on now in North Africa, we definitely have to pay attention to it. This century is a century that announces itself over the last decade now, 10 years have already gone by. So we're well into this century and understanding what it is. And it is a century that's very full of asymmetric threats. And those threats aren't going to go away. And the challenge is we have an asymmetric threat envelope in a symmetric way of responding to them, which doesn't always work very well. The 21st century is characterized by not only asymmetric threats, but also the speed of information, the speed of knowledge. People all over the world are really starting to understand how some of the other world lives. And what's happened in North Africa, I think, is an expression, a popular expression, not one that's inspired by al-Qaeda or any other terrorist network, but a popular expression, derived from increased knowledge and awareness by the next generation of people, young people, who want to be governed differently and want more transparency in how they're governed and want better opportunities for themselves economically. And so the three aspects of what goes into making that possible are fundamental to, I think, whatever we do. The problems in North Africa are similar in many ways, but each one of them is very different. And we have to take them one at a time. The changing dimension of our security portfolio means that no longer is it going to be enough to just send in the Sixth Fleet, for example, or the Air Force, or the Marines, or the soldiers, or a combination thereof. It has to be we have to deal with these strategic problems in ways that allow us to do what we do best, and that is to apply a whole-of-government approach. And it's not just a national effort. It's got to be an international effort as well. So the three pillars of engagement for my money, in terms of anything that's going on in the Mediterranean, are obviously security is one pillar. The second one is some economic development. And the third is governance and rule of law. And there's a lot of other subcategories to that. But fundamentally, we talk about things like freedom and democracy and more transparency in government. We've been talking about this for a long time. We've suggested, across many administrations, to various leaders in different countries, the idea that this bottom-up effort by people is something you can't stop. You can't squash it. And eventually, it will find its day. The only difficulty is in predicting when something like that is going to happen. And no one could have predicted that the spark in Tunisia that caused it. But now, it's on a roll. And it's hard to say where it's going to stop. And so critically, I think, important in this is that while we have a special challenge with regard to addressing this next generation of leaders as they come up because some of them are upset with us because we supported one way or the other, the previous generation that they're obviously unhappy with. So we have to figure out exactly how we're going to engage with these new leaders and make sure that democracy and freedom has an opportunity to be successful because nothing is a given here. 30 years ago in Iran, the downfall of the Shah was largely in the name of more transparency, a freer society, and more options and more opportunity and different type of government. And they sure got a different kind of government. And 30 years later, we're still dealing with that situation. We cannot afford to take our eyes off the ball with regard to what's going on around the Mediterranean. Certainly, our European friends understand that because of the proximity of the borders. They have, in addition to a lot of trade relations and energy dependence and the like, but you also have some not-so-good things that could happen, illegal immigration, human trafficking, narco-terrorism, the emerging combination of organized crime with narco-trafficking and terror, all three of those things working together. The distances are not that great, so it's very easy to understand why our European friends are concerned, and therefore because we are part of the alliance, we should be concerned. As a matter of fact, within the NATO alliance, there's an organization that not many people know about that's called the Mediterranean Dialogue. The Mediterranean Dialogue has about seven countries in it, as I recall. And it is essentially a political military body that gets together, and I hope they still do, but at least in the 2003 timeframe, we resurrected it. And Israelis were sitting across the table from Egyptians with Tunisians, with Algerians, Mauritanians, and Jordanians, and Egyptians, and having real dialogue. And this dialogue was substantive, and so there's a framework there where people can talk to each other, where militaries can exchange views, and it's within NATO. So regarding the Mediterranean and all that's going on there, regardless of how different it is, from my standpoint, this is a very historical moment. And we need to make sure, and we need to do whatever we need to do to make sure that it comes out because the consequences are going to be extremely long-lasting. We don't know how Syria is going to work itself out. You can be sure that Iran is doing what it needs to do to try to make sure that it comes out the way they want it to come out. And so while we have this overt cover of democratic tendencies, you can be sure that under the waves, there's a lot going on to make sure that the democracy doesn't take hold, and that Iran continues to avoid scrutiny of the world with regard to its nuclear weapons program, its fundamental support to terrorist organizations, and the like. In the Middle East, I don't know what more to say about the Middle East peace process, except that this is also a part of the whole panoply of events. And to think that now is not the time to make strides in this process, I think, is a strategic mistake of hopefully not historical consequences. But I think it's quite possible that by not moving forward on the peace process, on the part of either Israel or the Palestinians, is a mistake. And I hope that we can find the right vehicle to move that in the right direction. So on the positive side of things, while the current crisis is not terrorist organization inspired, we have this real pivot point where things could go one way or the other, and we have to be careful to do the right thing. We should pay close attention to our European friends who, A, know a lot more about the area than we do, and obviously have tremendous interest. But even if it stopped tomorrow, even if the problems just somehow miraculously just stopped and froze in place, things won't be the same in that region, in my view. This is a historical change. It's coming from the bottom up. It's coming from the people. And I think leaders all over the world, particularly those who are, shall we say, non-democratic, are really looking over their shoulder and wondering if it's going to happen in their backyard. And I think that time will tell. It's impossible to predict how this is all going to work out. But things will certainly not be the same. Finally, one last point is, I think that great efforts should be made to consult with our friends and allies, especially now. We have got to make sure that Iran does not escape and avoid the scrutiny that it richly deserves. And it is the big cloud that hangs over the entire region. And it has the possibility of adversely impacting any number of outcomes in this current period of instability. One way in which to, that holds a lot of attraction to me, in which we can successfully engage, I think, in these developing countries, this movement towards democracy, is to think about a lesson that we all learned after World War II with the Marshall Plan. And if you take the three legs of the triad that I talked about, security, economic development, and governance and rule of law, it seems to me that the wealthier nations of the planet, but with special emphasis, perhaps on Europe and China and maybe Brazil and India, could get together and help usher in a new economic order, if you will, a new encouragement for better governance along democratic lines. And obviously, the security piece would depend on which country we're talking about. But somehow, an international effort to help bring about the change and bridge the gap that might exist presently with regard to future relations with the United States might be very helpful. And I think that this is one way to continue the war against terrorism. If you give people hope economically and better governance, and they're meeting their expectations that they can see that the next generation, their children, will be better and will be better off and have better opportunities, then I think that's something that we should think about. We cannot sit back and just watch things happen. This is not a time for the passive. This is a time for the bold. And that's why I think that certain leaders in the region need to stand up and say the right thing. Certain organizations need to also stand up and do the right thing from the Arab League to the African Union to NATO to the European Union to the UN. All of these international organizations can play a role in how this comes out. And it doesn't have to be bad news. And we can come out of this in a way that fosters our values, our leadership, and creates a new dimension of communications with the emerging new leaders of certain countries that are making a move towards perhaps their last best hope at having a better life for themselves and for their follow-on generation. So thank you very much, and I look forward to the discussion. Thank you very much, General. In thinking through the application of these ideas and the problem of coordination and resources, I'm struck that we didn't really discuss the ongoing coordinated NATO campaign in Libya. As we look to assisting Libya in what I think we all assume will be some sort of transition to something, we don't so much have a resource problem because Libya has lots of oil. But the record of democratization in countries with lots of mineral resources is poor. There's a capacity problem, especially among the Libyans who've lived under Qaddafi. And there's a coordination problem, not only among the Allies in general, but we don't have a presence on the ground. So given that you talked about the importance of pivot points, you talked about the importance of getting Iran wrong, what do we need to do now as a country and as part of NATO to get Libya right? Well, that's a very complex question, but I think one part of the answer that I would give is that whatever we do with Libya, let's not forget that strategically Egypt is certainly the point of main effort. What we're talking about in Libya here is tactics pretty much. And I don't think we have the clarity to see how this is all going to play out in terms of the NATO action thus far. I know that the elements of the regime have reached out unofficially around the world to try to see if there is a way out of this. But I don't really know exactly whether they are at a breaking point or how much longer this can go on. Depending on who you talk to, some people say that at the current rate that this government can hold off for a long, long time. That's not a good sign. But I think that the next thing that has to happen in Libya is obviously some sort of some sort of answer to the current crisis in terms of the government. And once that's resolved, then I think the international community has to apply some element of those three pillars, the security envelope, which we're seeing developed now, followed by some economic incentives. And then obviously the biggest one is governance and rule of law and how they're going to fit in North Africa. Well, General, could I press you on that issue a little bit and recalling your experience also in leading the Iraq Security Forces Commission? Clearly, we've seen in Libya, unlike Egypt, the army and the security forces have been used as an instrument of repression by the government. And whatever, however this ends, assuming that Qaddafi is no longer in power, there'll be a need for some kind of security assistance with the international community transition to help if it is the interim transition national council that is ultimately taking over governance. But somehow, it seems, it'll be incumbent on the international community, beginning with NATO and the members of the coalition that have supported the effort to protect the Libyan people, to allow them to determine their future. I wonder how you see, looking back at that experience or if you've thought about it, there hasn't obviously been a lot of discussion in public about this. But I'm hoping and I assume that there has been some discussion about this within government circles. What role should NATO and the EU play? What role could other organizations, regional partners, the Arab League, Turkey, other countries, in sort of stabilization so that the process, just as in Iraq, that first we have to establish security, then we can talk about new governmental structure and rule and law. So how do we avoid the mistakes or the aftermath of the Iraq situation in Libya? Well, I think one of the best things that happened, at least in the body politic internationally, is that the Arab League was involved from day one. And I would say the involvement of the African Union is also extremely important. The neighborhood has to be concerned about this. And this cannot be a Western European solution set that is somehow dictated from Brussels or any other capital. But the good news is that once we have more clarity in terms of the government, that there's enormous capacity out there within the Arab world, but also within the European, and more global interests. And I think that one way in which the United States can help is not to do it all by ourselves, but to become a catalyst for other rapidly growing economies to also understand that they have a stake in this. And to join us in a comprehensive, well-articulated international effort to show the people of Libya or Tunisia or Egypt or any other country that's moving in the direction that seems to indicate that they're moving towards a freer, more democratic society to show that there's a waiting world out there that's ready to welcome them if that's what they want. And that's the direction they're moving in. The risk, of course, is that we don't do anything. And these very definite subversive elements that are operating under the cover of this euphoric move towards freedom are probably very well organized, very well funded, and might just snatch the victory at the end of the day. So we have to watch that very carefully. I'm delighted that you talked about Egypt being strategically important because I've been paying close attention to Egypt for 20 years. And we'll just take the next hour and talk about Egypt. When we talk about a more democratic transition in Egypt, one of the things that is likely to mean is greater Islamist participation in politics. And that sent up some alarm bells on Capitol Hill about what that might look like. It's not about the impoverished because the Muslim Brotherhood is principally a middle class, upper middle class, movement of professionals. That's where their base is. So economic growth doesn't help that problem. And what it may do is nudge Egypt's foreign policy in the direction that Turkey's foreign policy has been going, which is to make it less compliant with the United States. It could have implications for the Egyptian-Israeli relationship and the way Israelis feel in the neighborhood and everything else. As we think about where Egyptian politics go, how should we think about Islam and politics, its potential impacts on Egyptian foreign policy and what that would mean for American interests? Well, I think we probably should be pretty happy if Egypt turned out to be like Turkey, frankly. I think despite some of the ins and outs of most recent policies with regard to sanctions on Iran as a result of their nuclear program, the relationships at the very senior levels between the Turkish and American governments are generally quite good. We do have a big PR problem in Turkey in terms of how they look at the United States. And we have a big PR problem in a lot of the Muslim world in terms of how they look at the United States because our critics will say, well, these are the guys that supported the guys that you're trying to replace or that you have replaced in the case of Egypt. So how can they be your friends? And I think there is a way in which we can find a accommodation in good relations by doing the things that would encourage them across the three areas that I discussed that would help them be whatever it's going to be. I mean, there are some things that we're not going to control. And so we're looking for the best possible outcome. And to me, the best possible outcome is to help them develop a society that is representative of the way they want to be governed, but also has transparency and respect for human rights and can be welcomed into the family of nations with proper support of economic assistance, forgiveness and things of that nature that would show that we are a nation that is trying to be friendly, trying to be helpful, and trying to welcome them into this new phase of their history. But it's extremely important that we be successful here. I can't stress that enough. So is that doing more than the administration's done with the billion dollars in loan relief, the billion dollars in OPEC guarantees, $150 million in immediate aid? I mean, are we talking about increasing the military aid more than $1.3 billion a year? Well, again, I mean, there's a national policy here, and then there's an international leadership responsibility here. And unfortunately, this happens at a really bad economic time. So I'm not suggesting that the United States do what we typically do is more than anybody else proportionally. But I do think that we can play a big role internationally in properly funding those things through international cooperation. And it's in all of our interest that those work out the right way. So I think symbolically, this is a good start with the administration proposed. But I also think that we need to develop our leadership commitment to making this a successful effort that has international participation. Well, actually, General, I would like to ask you about some of that, how we might orchestrate that within the broader international community. Of course, beginning with our partners in the European Union, which, as you noted, have been part of the Mediterranean dialogue in the security sector, they've had the EU Barcelona process, working with those countries in the Mediterranean region. Clearly, Turkey is very interested and engaged in all of these countries. There's been a great deal of discussion about the Turkish inspiration, not the model, but the inspiration on the idea you yourself alluded to Turkey as, if Egypt turned out the way Turkey did over the course of the next 30 years, that would be quite an achievement. I wonder, do you see a way to orchestrate this, and perhaps even an opportunity here to advance US cooperation with both the European Union and Turkey in a common project in promoting positive change in political systems, the rule of law? Obviously, being very careful to listen to the demand side and not trying to, we saw the Bush period where it seemed as if the US and some others had this idea through the Greater Middle East Initiative of imposing a model on some of the Arab countries. That didn't work. Certainly, we've seen from the Egyptians and others, they have some of their own ideas. But how do you think we could orchestrate this, and is this indeed maybe an opportunity to have a common positive project involving the US, the European Union and Turkey, which of course is having its own problems in the accession discussions with the European Union, to put our common efforts together at a time of austerity, at least in the case of our own government and the European Union governments? Well, one of the things that happened in 2009 and one of the things that facilitated the reset of our relationship with Russia was Iran. And as a matter of fact, in early 2009, nobody I think would have predicted that China, Russia, and the United States would agree on sanctions against Iran. Yet it happened. I think that this is an opportunity to go beyond a little bit what you're suggesting. I mean, I think that, at a minimum, we should be doing that. But I think there are other economies that are doing quite well, Brazil, India, and China, that could be brought into this discussion, and not only here, but in places like Afghanistan and Pakistan as well. But where the developed part of the developed nations, if you will, or the wealthier nations, however you want to phrase it, it's in our strategic interest to help these developing countries get to where they want to be. And each one will be different. On the question of energy, for example, we have a number of developing countries that are rapidly approaching that stage in their energy portfolio where they have to decide whether they're going to go into the pollution stage or we're going to go to clean energy. And countries like ours are going to have to decide how we make those technologies available to them so they can skip that generation or that aspect of energy development. So it's not all going to be the same, but this is a time where proactive engagement has to replace reactive engagement. I mean, we emerged from the 20th century where our institutions were very reactive, and we had a much different ordered world. We had time to debate things. We had time to move issues along the international debating societies and so on and so forth. Time is not on our side here. The events are moving too rapidly. Too many things are happening on the globe simultaneously, and we need more agility in not only being able to respond to things that surprise us, but also to be able to prevent future conflicts from happening through a prescription that could be written out earlier. It would be a lot cheaper than having to let the cancer, if you will, to use a medical term, metastasize, and then you have to go in and really spend 10 years or so, like we've been doing in some of these countries, to fix it. So a proactive strategy with the proper leadership by the countries that can make a difference, I think, can profoundly affect the outcome of this quest for more freedom on the part of several nations. And I would imagine there are going to be more. And can shape, I think, the 21st century in a completely different way if we do it right. You mentioned Iran as sort of an example of things that went wrong, and we talked about the strategic importance of Egypt. I was giving a talk a few weeks ago, and somebody said, well, I understand that Turkey is the positive model for how Egypt comes out. How do we keep Egypt from turning into Pakistan? We've had a long relationship with the Pakistani military. We've had an involved policy with the Pakistani military. What lessons should we draw from that experience to avoid going there at this strategic juncture? I mean, we all draw lessons from our life cycle experiences, probably the biggest lesson in my life, and something I've always tried to do in trying to understand things that are happening around the globe is what do the people want? I mean, what do the masses want? We can't want something for them that they don't want for themselves. I'm convinced of that. We can't want, for Afghanistan, we can't want democracy and good governance and all of the things that we value. But we can't want that unless the people themselves in Afghanistan also want it, and they have to want it more. And so I think that there's a certain step that you have to take before you. You can't do everything. So you have to make a certain value judgment on what is the movement here. And sometimes it's blindingly apparent, like in Egypt. There's no question about where the people were going with this thing. So in a sense, that question has been asked and answered for Egypt. And how you prevent them from becoming another Pakistan is going to depend a lot on the institutions that are currently there. And happily, the army has generally behaved responsibly. We'll see what the elections in September look like, obviously. But this is a very, very pivotal time. And we should be, I think, in conjunction with other countries, we should be working, watching very, very closely to make sure that we are helpful in ways that can be helpful and that we also understand what's going on under the waves in terms of trying to destabilize Egypt and make it and turn it into another Pakistan, which a country like Yemen might become, for example. And that may be already too late. Well, actually, I'm glad you mentioned Yemen. And by the way, just for our audience, we're going to continue as the two-point guards here, continuing to pass to our Star Center forward. And then we'll turn it over to you shortly to some general questions. But on Yemen, as we discussed before the program began, Secretary Kissinger has written about the transition strategy in Afghanistan and sort of the whole question of the growing cry that we need to refocus, that maybe Afghanistan is no longer the central front in the war on terrorism. As you look at Yemen, as you look at what else is happening, do you think that that's right, that we need to pivot now? And it is a time, obviously, we have a plan for a transition. And there's many elements of this that have to still be put in place. And nobody is suggesting precipitous withdrawal. But do you think we do need to rebalance the level of effort and that perhaps the administration's assessment of early 2009, that Afghanistan was the focal point, is now the new focal point in countering extremism more hinging around the Gulf region and in the broader southwest Asia region, obviously, from Pakistan and through the Gulf? Well, I think however we started in the AFPAC review, we made a conscious decision in 2009 to view Afghanistan and Pakistan and India as a strategic, as in a regional way. For my money, I think Pakistan has become more of a concern, where terror is concerned, than Afghanistan. We have seen, we've watched the migration of al-Qaeda down to Yemen over to Somalia and to Sudan across the North African literal and the down into the Maghreb and Sahel regions. I've always been very worried that their ultimate goal is a country like Nigeria. The good news, to the extent that there is any, the good news is that the body, the intelligence body of many countries have really worked together very effectively in exchanging information in a timely way. And there's been really astounding level of cooperation that has prevented any major attacks since 9-1-1. I think nobody would have predicted that we'd be able to be that successful. My sense is that where terror is concerned, and in particular the al-Qaeda-like movements, that we know a lot more about them than a lot of people think. And we are at least staying abreast of where they are and where they're going, as opposed to trying to find them and chasing them around. We know kind of where they are, and we know who their players are. We know who their leaders are. And we've had astounding success at neutralizing substantial portions of their leadership. I don't know who'd want to be designated as a leader right now, because that puts me walking around with a bullseye on his back. And if we get to that point, I think that's good. Now, Yemen is going to be, is a problem. And it's so chaotic that I don't even want to speculate on how it might come out. But we know that al-Qaeda and one of the notorious leaders of al-Qaeda is based out of there. This is going to be a time where countries like Saudi Arabia and other countries are going to have to step up to the plate and do some of the things that traditionally we have done. They're a wealthy country. This is on their border. We can be helpful in many ways, and we should be. But it's going to be a team effort. It's not going to be the United States all by itself in the future. And on this issue of Saudi Arabia and the team effort, we certainly have been on the same team in Yemen. But it's not clear going forward. We will be on the same team, partly because the Saudi desire for the future of Yemen and the future for all the countries surrounding is not this rapid transition toward democracy that we've talked about. And we've seen the way the GCC has responded to a number of things and opening up to Jordan and Morocco and other places. Much more conservative. We've seen tremendous US-Saudi tensions erupting over the last four or five months. How do we think about building a partnership with Saudi Arabia when increasingly Saudis see the United States, A, neglecting the Iranian threat, B, promoting subversion in the entire neighborhood, and fundamentally being a threat to Saudi Arabia rather than a bulwark for Saudi Arabia? Well, on the Iranian question, I would disagree with the notion that the Saudi-US relationship is not solid, having participated in many of those discussions. I would also argue that what has happened over the last two years with regard to Iran and its nuclear program is that we know a lot more now. And there is greater exchange of information at the national levels with regard to the status of the program and when it might be approaching kind of a point of no return. And so that part of it, I think, is pretty solid. And we have done an awful lot with Saudi Arabia, a country that I think is very, very key in terms of what happens in the region, obviously, but also is a key partner for the United States. And we should not let anything happen that would derail that despite occasional disagreements. On the question of terrorism, we have really worked very well with Saudi Arabia very effectively, particularly on their border with Yemen. And I really think, and I'm hopeful, that we'll work through this period of time and whatever bumps we have right now will smooth themselves out. Because in the strategic sense, I completely agree with those who say that don't lose sight of Iran and all of this. We're talking in Libya earlier. That's a tactical question. But the strategic question is what happens in Egypt, what's happening in Syria, and Iran. And one way in which the Middle East peace process could really affect the outcome in the region is by having some progress in the Israeli-Palestinian stalemate. That would, I think, be a reversal in terms of the Iranian fortunes, and that would be something that they really don't want to see happen. They really don't want to see Syria fall, and they really don't want to see a peace process started. And we should do everything we can, I think, to make sure that that does, in fact, happen. That goes for Syria, as well. Pardon me. That goes for seeing that Bashar al-Assad falls? In my view, yes. OK. One other plate that's still reverberating that we haven't talked much about in general. As we mentioned earlier, you spent a great deal of your time trying to advance the stabilization of Iraq. The whole question of how we leave Iraq this year, or if it's a little bit longer if we're surprised isn't the Iraqi government does ask us to stay longer in some form. Obviously, it's going to have a big impact on some of our key partners in the region, beginning with Turkey, and the question of how, whether we've done enough to end the terrorism that's launched against Turkey from northern Iraq. What about the stabilization of Iraq as a long-term bulwark against Iranian hegemony? How many of the states in the Gulf will view this? What do you see as the baseline of a successful disengagement from Iraq later this year or sometime next year? Well, I was just in Iraq a couple of weeks ago, and I've actually revisited the northern part, where I'd been last as a colonel 20 years ago, 1991. And I was astounded by the progress that is going on. And what is now known as Kurdistan, if you will. Shops are open. Schools are being built. They've discovered phenomenal amounts of oil and natural gas. And it's really quite something to see that. On the broader question of Iraq itself, I'm personally a little concerned about some of the overtures that I see the government making towards Iran. I realize that they have a tough neighbor, and it's a tough neighborhood. But this would be a very bad outcome, I think, if in fact we had a sympathetic government towards Iran recognizing that they have to live in the neighborhood. But I'm worried about some of the trends that I'm seeing there. I'm worried about the solder's influence. And it would be interesting to see if they do ask us to stay a little bit longer. They do need more help. They do need more advisory help. They need more logistical help. They need more training. And it'll be interesting to see if they do that. My personal opinion is they probably won't. But we'll see. Before we open this to questions, I did want to press you a little more on the Middle East peace process issue. And both how we should be working with our European partners to try to move this forward, especially moving the politics forward, because it seems to me it's much easier to have a conference and create the environment in which a conference can be successful. So what is the role of the broader partnership in doing that? What's the role of the United States in creating politics that are more conducive to it, especially given the dynamics in Israel, which are moving those politics toward more skepticism about the need to make peace now? Well, I think for the last few years, we've really missed an opportunity. The opportunity I would describe is roughly a common view between us, the moderate Arab world, and the Europeans. Everybody, all of those parties kind of agreed that something had to be done. And generally, everybody agreed on what it would look like. Up to about 93%, 94%, a common view of what the solution set would look like at the end. But the two principles have not been able to find a path to even sit at the table and have even the slightest progress towards something that is both in both their interests. So the tragedy here is that things are now going on around them that did not exist six, eight months ago or a year ago. And so now it complicates things. At least for those who don't want to make any progress on this, they use that as an excuse. Oh, it's just not the right time. But time is not on anybody's side here. We have a very important vote coming up in the United Nations, I think in September, where it's quite possible that more people, more countries, will recognize the state of Palestine, will recognize the state of Israel at the end of the vote. And then we are, the United States, we put in a very difficult position of having to decide what to do about that. Again, compared to some people, I haven't been working on this very long. But by the same token, whenever you come into it, the problem is always the same. And the solution is always the same. Nobody is suggesting that this is a light switch, where before anything's agreed to, everything has to be agreed to. I think there's a recognition on both sides that it's going to take time before you get to a final status, if you will. But you've got to start. I mean, this is a critical moment, likely very historical. And this is a piece of it. And this is probably the one piece that would reverberate around the world, like a ripple of a rock being thrown in the lake, but reverberate far further out in the globe than just about anything else that could be done. And I find it frustrating in the extreme that we can't even make the smallest step towards making that happen. And I continue to just be amazed that we don't have the leaders of the two leaders who were involved cannot find this accommodation, which would be good for both countries. You've been very patient. We're going to open it up to questions. I would ask that you restrict the scope of your questions to what we've been discussing, essentially the Middle East and Mediterranean Basin writ large. I would ask that until everybody's had a chance to ask a question, you only ask one question, that you ask your question in the form of a question, which is to actually ask the general question rather than making a statement and saying what do you think of my statement. Steve has the unenviable job of making enemies by calling up people. And do we have microphones? Yes, we do have microphones. So if you'd also wait for a microphone, thank you. Harlan Ellman here in the front row, and then I'll go to the back. If you would just wait for the microphone, please. Because we are recording this. And then since I always wanted to be a Lieutenant Colonel in the Marine Corps, I thought I'd ask you an appropriate question. As we wind down from Afghanistan and something happens in Libya one way or the other, what do you see the future of NATO post-Afghanistan, post-Livia, with the summit coming up next year in Washington and budgets going south? Could you just speculate on how you think those events in Libya and Afghanistan might possibly impinge on NATO's future? I think that's an excellent question. I was very pleased with the NATO summit in Portugal in December and the adoption of a new strategic concept, which bodes well, I think, for the alliance and how it might be used to face the 21st century conflicts. Clearly, if Afghanistan is a disaster for some reason, we wind up leaving and it falls apart. And that will be obviously a very bad lesson and leave a bitter aftertaste in most people's mouths and who knows what the impact would be. But in Libya, I think we're operating under a mandate that was levied by the United Nations. So I think that's a little bit the horse of a different color. But I really think that the question for NATO is what is NATO willing to do in this proactive envelope and to what is NATO's role, for example, in helping Egypt transition to a more democratic form of government, if that's what the people want, and how do you do that? And are you willing to do that? Or is NATO going to sit back and, again, take a reactive and defensive posture that says we wait for bad things to happen and then we talk about them and then we react to them? So I think that's the pivot point here for NATO. And what does it do next? I'm cautiously optimistic that Afghanistan, good enough, will be what we achieved by 2014. And we'll see how it goes. OK, I'll entertain it. So I will entertain a two-finger question. If you're truly disciplined, and I'll come back to you. Admiral Lohan? Thank you. Lauren, I'm sorry. Don Lawrence, the Tory group. Just as a follow-on to that question, given the nature of the type of events NATO has been involved in, in Afghanistan, certainly in Libya, and the potential for NATO expansion involving many more people, even beyond the queue that has established since the fall of the Soviet Union, to that Mediterranean rim, to perhaps the Levant, perhaps the non-aligns, what do you think the prospects and the utility for continued NATO expansion are? Before you get to that, just the gentleman in the back, was your question on this area on NATO, or was it on something else? OK, let's look at it. No, I just thought if we could cluster a few. If there any more, look ahead. Yeah, my feeling about NATO expansion is that countries should be admitted to NATO having proven themselves in a way that they bring value to the alliance. I don't particularly sign up to the idea that we bring sick children into the alliance with the idea that, well, maybe they'll get better if they're part of us. I think that we should hold a standard pretty high for what it takes to become a NATO member. I also think that we should take a look at those countries that want an association with NATO, but don't necessarily want to be members. And right now, they're all lumped together in one big pile. And so I am for putting the brakes on expansion, at least for a while. NATO needs to get its own economic house in order. And we have to have a lot of internal discussions on that. We've got a new strategic concept. But I think that trying to differentiate between countries that are on a membership track and what it is they have to do to eventually get to that full membership and countries that simply want a partnership, I think we can have better clarity between them. And so those are two things, those are a couple of things that I think I would do. But I would be more insistent that new NATO members bring value to the alliance. And they have to prove themselves of being economically viable, governmentally sound, free of corruption, and add capacity to the alliance in some way in the security portfolio. Could I just intervene briefly here? I'm just going to come to the next gentleman's question. But one country that is seeking a much closer relationship with NATO in this region is Israel and also some of the Gulf states. I'm not actively seeking membership, but I'm sure they would if a NATO missile defense system were built, I think several of the Gulf states in Israel would like to be integral members of that organization. Do you think that's a good idea? I wouldn't rule it out. But again, I think that we have the NATO, the Mediterranean dialogue, so there is an affiliation there for countries like Jordan and Israel. There are seven members, but a lot of them are North African rim countries to have a partnership with the alliance. And that, to me, could include missile defense. I don't know where you draw the line between what members do and non-members don't do. But I don't have any problem with greater partnerships. My lesson learned would be don't bring countries into the alliance that haven't proven themselves to be worthy of membership. OK, thank you. The gentleman in the back, even patient, please. And then I'll come in. You emphasize the importance of scrutiny on the Iranian nuclear program. And I understand that your concern is absolutely legitimate, because you emphasize the importance of scrutiny on, first of all, my name is Mohammad and I'm with the Center for Justice and Peace. You emphasize the importance of scrutiny on the Iranian nuclear program. And I think that your concern is legitimate, because nuclear technology, nuclear power, has the potentiality of wreaking havoc on Earth. However, in the case of Iran, they claim that their program is for peaceful purposes. But international stakeholders have concerns about their nuclear ambitions that at some point in the future they might develop nuclear weapons. So I think that this is legitimate. However, I would like to ask, what about other players in the region? What about, for example, the state of Israel, who's not even a signatory to the nonproliferation treaty? How do we promote American credibility in the region as an impartial peace broker when we turn a blind eye to one stakeholder and hound the other? And I was just wondering if maybe any even-handed approach would bring about free stability and genuine and just peace in the region. Thank you. Well, obviously a complex question. The fact of the matter on Iran is that the door is still open to Iran to do the right thing. Nobody is trying to restrict nuclear power from Iran for peaceful uses, if that's what they wish. But what the world body politic has asked for is some assurances that this is in fact what they're doing. And they won't even provide that. So there's a fair amount of evidence that suggests that they are, in fact, trying to develop a nuclear weapons capability. The fallout from that would be a nuclear arms race in the Gulf. There's no question about that. And perhaps even worse is this is a country that exports terrorism and exporting weapons of mass destruction, particularly nuclear weapons of mass destruction if they acquired the technology would fundamentally change the ways of the world that we live in. It's that simple. So these are big stake issues. As far as our policies with regard to other countries, obviously consistency is important. I think this administration has done a very good job in showing our commitment to reducing our own nuclear stockpile. The START treaty was indicative of the fact that both Russia and the United States took their responsibilities seriously. The successful conference that was hosted by President Obama here in Washington in 2010, I think it was, on proliferation was a big success. So I think there are a lot of things that are going on. And I think the US has generally tried to be very consistent and even-handed and has shown that it's willing to lead by example in trying to rid the planet of nuclear weapons. But the Iranian obscenity here has been a problem. And I can assure you that we've tried everything in terms of approach, reason, respect, sovereignty issues. And so far, nothing has worked. And so we're now at the sanctions level of a linear track, but we're at the sanctions level. And we're hopeful that the leadership will have a moment of clairvoyance and do the right thing. But we have not seen any indication that that's going to happen in the near future. Is there a question over here? If you could just wait for the mic, please. Thank you. General Jones, when you look at the country. I'm sorry. Yeah, I'm sorry. Bill Koenig with Koenig International News. OK, thank you. You bet. General Jones, when you look at country after country in the Middle East, we have conflicts, tribal conflicts, Arab versus Arab. Right now, Israel has, in their northern border, 50 to 55,000 rockets and missiles pointed at them. Also, Amos has probably smuggled in more weapons in the last four years than the previous 30 years. So why should anybody expect Israel to live in peaceful borders or secure borders by cutting a deal with Hamas, who won't even recognize Israel's right to exist? In other words, putting Hamas into Judea and Samaria and East Jerusalem would put that country, Israel, at great risk. And why do we continue this peace process when we have so poor examples throughout the Middle East? Thank you. Well, the reason I bemoan the fact that nothing's happened over the last few years is because the more we wait, the harder it seems to me, the harder it gets. And you do have this question of Hamas and what to do about that. The fact is that the fatah in the West Bank has generally been a pretty good success. If you look at the quality of life, the standard of living, trade, economic opportunities, the difference between the West Bank and Gaza is noticeable. The United States and others have pledged to underwrite Israel's security at the same time to respect the sovereignty of their neighbor, the so-called Palestinian state that will someday emerge next door. But it is not in anybody's interest to wait until the situation gets worse and then try to fix it. You're completely correct that the threat escalates. But I think that I personally believe that by tackling this problem, now we'll make it easier. This is an easier time than if we wait another two or three years. A lot of it depends on what happens in Syria, what happens in Lebanon, what happens in North Africa to a certain extent, what's the New Egypt going to look like, but not to even make the slightest progress on this very, very difficult problem that just boggles the mind because I think it's in the interest of both states. There was another question here. Yes, I'm sorry. I'm not connected. Yes, sir. Hi, Jim LeBlanc, a unit of resources group. General, first of all, thank you for your comments and your service to the country. Very appreciated. Question I've got is more of an overall general question of the reality check that we haven't heard a lot about today so far of what's going to end up being a dramatic loss of influence by the United States and the region in the coming years and months. With massive deficit reduction, the United States isn't going to have the amount of money to throw out the problems anymore. You've got other regional players coming up, whether it's the Gulf Cooperation Council, Saudi Arabia, the way we've approached Yemen, Bahrain, Libya, Syria. Just what are your thoughts going forward into the future of how much serious influence the United States will, in fact, have? I think it's very essential that the United States maintain its leadership position in the 21st century on these issues. Yes, we do have some limitations, obviously, as to what it is we can do economically. Hopefully, we'll get those sorted out. But I think that my experience in this global business is that much of the world wants the United States to continue to play a leadership role and does not want to see us abandon that position that was earned the hard way in the 20th century. But I think we have to figure out how we change the institutions that will enable us to do that, not only our own national institutions, but some of the international institutions. We have to prevail upon other players who are rising powers economically and otherwise to see the wisdom of joining in a partnership to make sure that these outcomes that we've been talking about for the last hour or so, in fact, come out that way. My personal view is that the United States is still looked at as a shining light on top of the hill, if you will, whatever analogy you want. But our values, our freedom, our way of life, how we assimilate our society, how much of a contribution immigrants have made to who we are today. I mean, we are a crucible where people can look at us and see a little bit of themselves and see it in a way that says, we can live like that. We can be governed like that. We can have hopes and aspirations that we haven't had before. And so the world is changing around us. Our relative influence may wax and wane a little bit. But I think it's extremely important that we find, we not turn our back on what's going on in the world, and that we try to find other ways in which we can play the responsible leader and hold and meet the expectations, I think, of many, many people around the world for that by way of demonstrating that leadership potential. Just a brief commercial message. I've proposed the general's comments about the desire for many countries still seeking US leadership. You'll see in your fold as a reference to a new study that CSIS is just putting out on the rise of the rest, in a sense, how many countries around the world are looking at US power and the future US power, accepting all the limits that the general pointed out. But anyway, for your future edification, edited by our ABLE introducer, Craig Cohen, who will start up. But there was a question over here, sir, yes. Jim Stark, Department of the Navy. General, you talked earlier in your remarks and also in answer to this latest question about the need for the US to exert a leadership role. And yet when it came time for an international coalition to do something about the situation in Libya, the US response was to lead from behind, thereby causing a good deal of consternation and concern among some of our allies. Do you think that's the proper model for the future? And do you think it's working well? I don't necessarily think it's a model for the future. I think it's the model for the moment. And I frankly like the idea that other countries are in the lead for a change. I mean, we have been doing this for a long time in Iraq, in Afghanistan, different parts of the world. There was an urgency in Europe that catapulted other governments to act. I don't think that's necessarily an alarming thing. The United States is contributing greatly to supporting the operations. Obviously, we enable an awful lot of the activities that are ongoing. But I think it sends a good message to our American people who have gotten used to seeing the United States being the only one, or by far, the most dominant country in terms of expending treasure and blood on the battlefields. So I think that at the end of the day, within the alliance in particular, this will have a good effect. And it really illustrates that we're all in this together and that everybody's got to do their fair share. And so to have what I think will be a one-off type of engagement structured a little bit differently is not a bad thing. There was another question over there. OK, I'm sorry. I'm in the far corner. I'm sorry. I have a little trouble seeing around the podium. If you could just wait for the microphone. Thanks, General. My name is Joe Straw. I'm from the New York Daily News. Specific to Syria, I was wondering what you thought are the best hopes or options for positive change there, even if it's as simple as stopping the violence against innocents there? Well, again, the crystal ball doesn't work in all of these cases. But I think Assad's influence will never be the same, even if it stopped tomorrow. And somehow he manages to remain in power. He's been, I think, exposed for what he is. And the world will form its opinion based on that. I don't know what the next domino is in Syria. But it's clear that his standing in the court of public opinion at any rate globally has suffered irreparable damage. General, there was one that we need to close in just a moment, unless there's another question out there. There is one wonkish sort of question that you made a comment about, UCOM and AFRICOM. And we saw in the beginning, I thought some of our military participants here might pick up on your point, we saw that very early on in the Libya conflict, suddenly General Ham, who had, in his AFRICOM hat, had seen himself as largely a security cooperation provider and not so much a combatant commander, or at least certainly that was the way many people saw the command, suddenly was thrust into that, into being a combatant commander. And in the aftermath, there seems to have been some discussion about bringing AFRICOM and UCOM back together more closely. In other words, that perhaps complete separation isn't a good idea, particularly as we look towards dealing with security cooperation. And we are some of the key problems are going to be emerging, affecting European and transatlantic security in the coming years. Do you think, how did you see that? And do you think there's some need to bring the two back more closely together? And obviously, as you said, AFRICOM is in Stuttgart. It's not exactly all that distant from interaction, regular interaction with the European command and other aspects of NATO. But do you see any need for rethinking AFRICOM's mission and how the two commands relate? Well, before AFRICOM, UCOM had 91 countries, when you count all the African countries and the European countries. Frankly, I was very fortunate to have a wonderful deputy commander for UCOM named General Chuck Wald. And he basically ran the UCOM piece of it while I was preoccupied with NATO. Now, by responsibility, that was my responsibility. But you really have to be willing to delegate, because you just can't handle 91 countries the way you should be able to do. So I think the establishment of AFRICOM is a good idea. The unfortunate reality of AFRICOM is that it's not in Africa. And frankly, it's not in Africa because we teed it up wrong. We insist on calling unified commanders, combatant commanders. And you cannot sell a combatant command structure into another country. You just, I mean, I totally understand that. Having said that, the other thing that we didn't do is we didn't properly resource AFRICOM in the same way that UCOM has been resourced. Now, what does that mean? It means that, obviously, if you're going to have a unified commander called AFRICOM, he's got to have some assets and the budget and everything else that's required. This is evolutionary. But this nation received a great gift in the 20th century by having a global presence with these unified commands. Most of them in the theaters that they were trying to affect in our own hemisphere, in Panama, in the Gulf. And we have now seen, I think, a disturbing tendency to pull back on these unified commands. I think we should think about ways in which the unified command structure should be changed in terms of what it is they do, because I think national security now is much more complex than just the military equation, which is what we do best. But we have regional opportunities here with these forward positioned unified commands to really affect large parts of the world in a positive way. And I would hate to see that go away. I think how you build those commands could be a little bit different. There has to be a civil military relationship that's forward based, that has a regional focus. So I think the idea of AFRICOM is still good. I think the implementation needs to be pursued a little bit more. OK, well, great. Thank you, General. First, I'll have of all my CSIS colleagues. I want to thank you first for your service to the country, to your service to the transatlantic community as secure and in many other ways. Also as a devoted member of our board. Now back for a second term after your government service. So we thank you for that. And I hope all of you in the audience found it as illuminating a morning as I did. And we would like to join me in thanking General Jones and Apple Venture on this. Thank you. OK, I think you now, if you have your instructions to pick up your box lunches and head to the next session, the mid to the afternoon session. Thank you very much. Thank you. It's good to see you. Thank you.