EARTHQUAKE-RESISTANT BUILDINGS AND THE PROMISE OF COLD-STEEL

FROM:  NATIONAL SCIENCE FOUNDATION 
Cold-Formed Steel Rebuilds Earthquake-Resistant Architecture

A doctoral student discusses the engineering of earthquake-resistant buildings and the results of a recent shake table test.

Academia and industry are collaborating in a new effort to engineer earthquake-ready buildings. The effort based at Johns Hopkins University aims to design and test a single structure primarily built from cold-formed steel, a material that has boomed in structural engineering projects over the last 25 years.

With funding from the National Science Foundation, JHU engineering professor Benjamin Schafer helped bring together a team composed of industry professionals, professors, graduate students and the occasional high school or undergraduate student yearning for research experience to conduct experimental and computational seismic research on cold-formed steel components.

The first industry standards and codes for cold-formed steel were written in 1946 and are mostly based on empirical data, in many cases lacking underlying theory. When engineers attempt to make a building earthquake-resistant, they use specific structural components, appropriately called details, to absorb earthquake forces and help direct some of those forces back to the ground.

That works, but when an earthquake hits, the entire building reacts, not just the sections containing details. Even though academic research has lead to improvements to the original building codes over the decades, there is much to be learned about the entire system of a cold-formed steel building as it responds to an earthquake.

"When you have a big knowledge gap, you have a danger gap," says Schafer. To fill the gap, he and his collaborators are testing and analyzing individual components of a cold-formed steel structure, and taking what they learn about each piece to design a full-scale building that will undergo three stages of shake table tests. The tests will occur in 2013 at the NSF Network for Earthquake Engineering Simulation (NEES) site at the University of Buffalo in New York and are part of NEES's broader research efforts.

Cold-formed Steel in the Lab

Cold-formed steel is lightweight and shines like aluminum because it possesses a galvanized coating. Kara Peterman, a third-year Ph.D. student on the project, describes it as "steel that is rolled by a long string of machines into a thin sheet, then bent like origami into a desired shape."

With every shape change, each made at room temperature (hence the name cold-formed), the properties of the piece change, improving the qualities of the steel. Small tweaks have the potential to increase the steel strength, making one component more efficient than it was before. For example, when an 8-foot tall sheet of steel is converted into a u-shape with two 90-degree bends, it becomes a stud that can withstand ten thousand pounds of loading. The beam could carry five Volkswagen Beetles - each about two thousand pounds - yet it is light enough for Peterman to lift.

Peterman has been working with a second graduate student, Peng Liu, to assess how individual cold-formed steel components bear loads. She has tested components such as beam-columns and local connections in the JHU lab, and this past summer, she tested wall-to-floor connections. Liu, a visiting Northeastern University Ph.D. student from China, has been conducting experiments on shear walls, which are specifically made to resist lateral forces. He completed his testing in a facility at the University of North Texas. Liu also analyzes and interprets the raw data that his experiments have yielded.

Peterman and Liu relay very specific information to Jiazhen Leng, a Ph.D. student at JHU, who can then code a highly detailed building model, component by component, using OpenSees - open-source building analysis software. With the 3-D model in place, he has the ability to perform various analytics. In turn, his analytical data informs predictions for more experimental work, particularly the 2013 full-scale test. The work the graduate students perform comes full circle, linking them together.

The Big Blue Baby

In the bowels of Latrobe Hall, the civil engineering building on the JHU campus, dwells the Big Blue Baby, also known as the multi-axis structural testing rig. Schafer's research group, which designed the machine, is proud of the fact that there is only one other like it in the United States (at the University of Minnesota, also part of the NEES network.) The body is made of hot-rolled steel and the brain is a computer, which drives a hydraulic pump. The system sits in the center of the cramped lab, where black electrical wires snake along the ground toward other, smaller systems. Rows of walls, made in-house, lean against the back of the room, with stacks of sheathing and steel at the front.

"Compared to the NEES facilities, our room is tiny," admits Peterman. "But, we've gotten a lot out of this lab - great results, great publications, and great changes to the codes."

Experiments are large-scale tests of small components, because it's almost impossible to scale down every behavior. The Big Blue Baby can hold a standard wall in its belly and apply loads using hydraulic actuators, which look like thick, black tentacles. What makes this machine unique is its ability to perform combined loading. The punch can come straight down, twist from two different sides, or apply stress from several directions at once.

Most structures experience varying loads from multiple directions, so the Big Blue Baby simulates real-world engineering situations. The most common type of load is called the axial load, weight that comes directly down on a wall due to gravity - think furniture or snow. There are red emergency buttons around the rig, just in case the thirty thousand pound Baby decides to throw a tantrum and it must be taken offline.

The 2013 Shake Table Tests

Robert Madsen, Senior Project Engineer at Devco Engineering, Inc., is the primary link between the researchers and industry. Leading up to the 2013 large-scale tests, there is a meeting every three months between the academics and a larger industry advisory board for updates from both sides. Madsen provided the constructible design for the 2013 NEES building that the graduate students have been characterizing on a component level.

The plan is to construct a two-story building, 50 feet by 23 feet, inside the colossal NEES Buffalo lab. The building will sit upon dual shake tables that will be linked. The Buffalo building will undergo shake table tests in three major stages: the first will be as a steel skeleton; the second stage will include only walls and other structural components that engineers currently rely upon; and the third stage is a complete structure built to standard and ready to be inhabited.

Cue Narutoshi Nakata, co-principle investigator from JHU, brings his expertise in shake-table testing and performance evaluation. To attain meaningful and useful results, Nakata must determine the right number of sensors on the table, their locations, and what they will measure. He must also decide what type of ground motion the table will produce, such as fast versus slow, and the number of scenarios to enact. Based on Leng's 3-D model and analytical tests, Nakata creates the mathematical models of earthquakes that the shake table will generate, and will eventually analyze how the structure dynamically reacts. One of the scenarios is a reproduction of the 1994 Northridge earthquake - as a well-recorded, historical Los Angeles earthquake with a magnitude of 6.7, it is widely used for simulation experiments.

Immediate Impact

Schafer has involved high school and undergraduate students in the project to provide them with hands-on experience quite early in their careers. High school students often come from Baltimore Polytechnic Institute, a Baltimore City public school, which offers a research practicum course that allows those enrolled to volunteer at the JHU lab a couple hours per week. The latest volunteer was from Garrison Forest High School, a private all-girls school in Owings Mills, Md., which required the student to complete a specific research project she could present at the end of the semester. With Peterman's guidance, the student had the opportunity to explore connection testing variables.

The team also tries to get younger college students involved, because research is usually not an opportunity they have until they are juniors and seniors. After passing a trial period to prove their interest, two undergraduate students participated this past summer: one who just finished his freshman year, the other her sophomore year.

The Bigger Picture

Although the east coast is not often on the news for earthquakes, Schafer explains that, "Earthquakes are a matter of return period, not a matter of where you live. They come more quickly in California, but if you design a building and you expect it to exist for 20, 50, or 100 years, you'll go into the codes and you'll see almost anywhere you are in the U.S., you're going to need to design for earthquakes."

Schafer remains driven to impact fundamental knowledge and change U.S. practice. "If an engineer knew how the whole system responded," he adds, "instead of just one little bit, then they would be able to design the whole building to be earthquake ready."

REMARKS BY UNDER SECRETARY GOTTEMOELLER TO PRAGUE AGENDA IN 2013

FROM:  U.S. STATE DEPARTMENT
The Prague Agenda in 2013 - Challenges and Prospects
Remarks
Rose Gottemoeller
Acting Under Secretary for Arms Control and International Security 
Czech Ministry of Foreign Affairs
Prague, Czech Republic
September 6, 2013
As Delivered

Thank you for the introduction, Veronika. It is lovely to be here in Prague. My thanks to the Czech Ministry of Foreign Affairs, First Deputy Minister Jiri Schnider, the Institute of International Relations Prague, the Metropolitan University Prague and the Faculty of Social Sciences from Charles University Prague for their work in putting this conference together. My last visit to Prague was in April 2010, the day President Obama and then-President Medvedev signed the New START Treaty.

A lot of water has passed under the Charles Bridge since that time and Veronika has already mentioned that we are living in interesting times. That phrase, “May you live in interesting times,” is generally regarded as ominous – the implication being that a person in an interesting world is doomed to a tumultuous and possibly dangerous existence. There is no doubt that we live in interesting times, but I don’t accept the inevitability of uncertainty and danger. We have the power to control and shape our future. We are able to see the challenges facing us and to find ways to overcome those challenges. That is exactly what President Obama had in mind when he came to Prague four years ago to speak about America’s intent to seek the peace and security of a world without nuclear weapons.

His vision – which we call the Prague Agenda –was actually a continuation of the path set forth by previous Presidents. Every U.S. President in the nuclear age, beginning with President Harry Truman in 1945, has felt the weight of responsibility inherent in these weapons of near limitless destruction. I know, from our long experience working together, that that was the case for the leaders of the former Soviet Union and remains true for the leaders of the Russian Federation. These leaders and their advisors – as well as countless others inside and outside governments around the world, have all worked to stem the nuclear threat and to find ways to turn us away from catastrophic nuclear war.

The responsibility is ours to bear, but we are facing new and different threats. While the likelihood of a large-scale nuclear exchange has fortunately diminished through decades of cooperative, but also challenging disarmament work between Moscow and Washington, nuclear dangers have not disappeared. The threat posed by the spread of nuclear materials and technologies remains. The possibility that terrorists or other non-state actors could acquire a nuclear weapon ensures that the nuclear “Sword of Damocles” still hangs over us. While our nuclear arsenals have little direct relevance in deterring these threats, concerted action by the United States and Russia – and indeed, from all nuclear states – to reduce their weapon stockpiles and fissile material will strengthen the nuclear nonproliferation regime. A strong nonproliferation regime makes nuclear theft, unauthorized use and proliferation harder. The ultimate solution is straightforward: take away the tools – fissile materials and nuclear weapons – and you mitigate ultimately the threat.

Of course, that is much easier said than done. President Obama made it clear in the Prague Speech that the road to a world without nuclear weapons would be long and the goal may not be reached in his lifetime. To achieve success, we will need to follow a step by step process in which we maintain nuclear stability at the same time that we pursue responsible reductions in our nuclear capabilities through a number of measures, some of them quiet, and some of them front and center on the world stage.

The New START Treaty, signed here in Prague in April of 2010, was one of those front and center accomplishments, both in its negotiation and its entry into force. Now I am happy to tell you that its quiet, deliberate implementation is going smoothly behind the scenes, providing for mutual predictability and stability on the nuclear front. This is important in any day and age, but especially important in these days when we and the Russians must ensure that we are wisely spending our scarce defense resources.

Another accomplishment on the quiet front is the work that Russia and the United States have done to eliminate fissile material from warheads. Over the past twenty years, we have together eliminated the highly enriched uranium from approximately 20,000 warheads. The HEU has been transformed into low-enriched fuel and sold to power plants in the United States. Did you know that today 10 percent of the electricity generated in the United States is from former Soviet nuclear weapons? That’s a lot of warheads turned to peaceful purposes.

But it is not enough: the United States and Russian Federation still possess over ninety percent of the nuclear weapons in the world. This past June, President Obama spoke in Berlin about the next steps in the Prague Agenda. I will focus today on what he said about nuclear reductions. The President announced in Berlin that “we can ensure the security of America and our allies, and maintain a strong and credible strategic deterrent, while reducing our deployed strategic nuclear weapons by up to one-third.”

He also said that we would seek bold steps to reduce non-strategic nuclear weapons in Europe. How we go about these further reductions is not a matter only for Washington and Moscow, but also must involve close consultations with our allies. This work has already begun in Brussels at NATO and in other allied capitals in Europe and Asia.

Another essential element to the step-by-step process is reducing the role that nuclear weapons play in national security strategies. That is why the President’s new nuclear employment guidance directs the U.S. Department of Defense to align its planning with the U.S. policy that the use of nuclear weapons will be considered only in extreme circumstances to defend the vital interests of the United States and its allies and partners. In addition, the new guidance directs strengthening non-nuclear capabilities and reducing the role of nuclear weapons in deterring non-nuclear attacks. All of this derives from the underlying principle articulated in our 2010 Nuclear Posture Review, that it is in the interest of the United States and all other countries that nuclear weapons never be used again.

No secret: our efforts to move forward on the next steps are proceeding slowly; many issues of strategic stability and beyond are taking up the metaphorical “dialogue space.” This does not mean we stop trying to move ahead. Even in the darkest days of the Cold War, the United States and Russia found it in our mutual interest to work together on reducing the nuclear threat. Through creativity, patience and persistence, we have had many successes and together have contributed to a safer world.

When New START is fully implemented in 2018, we will be at the lowest levels of deployed strategic nuclear warheads since the 1950s – pre-Cuban Missile Crisis. That is quite a feat, but we have more to do. There is one simple reason to move to the next step – it is in our mutual interest, in political, security and budgetary terms.

To end, I want to read you something by President Reagan’s Secretary of State George Shultz that I came across recently. Speaking to the UN early in his tenure – now about 30 years ago – he outlined principles for action in foreign policy. His comments focused on how and why the United States should conduct negotiations, but I think the ideas ring true for all nations.

We manage our problems more intelligently, and with greater mutual understanding, when we can bring ourselves to recognize them as expressions of mankind’s basic dilemma. We are seldom confronted with simple issues of right and wrong, between good and evil. Only those who do not bear the direct burden of responsibility for decision and action can indulge themselves in the denial of that reality. The task of statesmanship is to mediate between two—or several—causes, each of which often has a legitimate claim…It is on this foundation that the United States stands ready to try to solve the problems of our time—to overcome chaos, deprivation, and the heightened dangers of an era in which ideas and cultures too often tend to clash and technologies threaten to outpace our institutions of control.

Secretary Shultz was right and his words can guide us today. I will end there, but I look forward to hearing from the other panelists and am happy to answer your questions.

Thank you.

RECENT U.S MISSILE DEFENSE TEST

FROM:  U.S. DEFENSE DEPARTMENT 
Successful Missile Defense Test Against Multiple Targets

The Missile Defense Agency (MDA), Ballistic Missile Defense System (BMDS) Operational Test Agency, Joint Functional Component Command for Integrated Missile Defense, and U.S. Pacific Command, in conjunction with U.S. Army soldiers from the Alpha Battery, 2nd Air Defense Artillery Regiment, U.S. Navy sailors aboard the guided missile destroyer USS Decatur (DDG-73), and U.S. Air Force airmen from the 613th Air and Operations Center successfully conducted a complex missile defense flight test, resulting in the intercept of two medium-range ballistic missile targets. The flight test was planned more than a year ago, and is not in any way connected to events in the Middle East.



The test was conducted in the vicinity of the U.S. Army Kwajalein Atoll/Reagan Test Site and surrounding areas in the western Pacific. The test stressed the ability of the Aegis Ballistic Missile Defense (BMD) and Terminal High Altitude Area Defense (THAAD) weapon systems to function in a layered defense architecture and defeat a raid of two nearly simultaneously launched ballistic missile targets.



The two medium-range ballistic missile targets were launched on operationally realistic trajectories towards a defended area near Kwajalein. Along with overhead space assets providing launch alerts, an Army-Navy/Transportable Radar Surveillance and Control (AN/TPY-2) radar in Forward Based Mode detected the targets and relayed track information to the Command, Control, Battle Management, and Communications (C2BMC) system for further transmission to defending BMDS assets.



The USS Decatur with its Aegis Weapon System detected and tracked the first target with its onboard AN/SPY-1 radar. The Aegis BMD weapon system developed a fire control solution, launched a Standard Missile-3 (SM-3) Block IA missile, and successfully intercepted the target.



In a demonstration of BMDS layered defense capabilities, a second AN/TPY-2 radar in Terminal Mode, located with the THAAD weapon system, acquired and tracked the target missiles. THAAD developed a fire control solution, launched a THAAD interceptor missile, and successfully intercepted the second medium-range ballistic missile target. THAAD was operated by soldiers from the Alpha Battery, 2nd Air Defense Artillery Regiment. As a planned demonstration of THAAD's layered defense capabilities, a second THAAD interceptor was launched at the target destroyed by Aegis as a contingency in the event the SM-3 did not achieve an intercept.



Initial indications are that all components performed as designed. MDA officials will extensively assess and evaluate system performance based upon telemetry and other data obtained during the test.



The event, a designated Flight Test Operational-01 (FTO-01), demonstrated integrated, layered, regional missile defense capabilities to defeat a raid of two threat-representative medium-range ballistic missiles in a combined live-fire operational test. Soldiers, sailors, and airmen from multiple combatant commands operated the systems, and were provided a unique opportunity to refine operational doctrine and tactics while increasing confidence in the execution of integrated air and missile defense plans.



U.S. Ballistic Missile Defense System programs have completed 62 successful hit-to-kill intercepts in 78 flight test attempts since 2001.

SECRETARY KERRY'S TESTIMONY ABOUT SYRIA BEFORE HOUSE ARMED SERVICES COMMITTEE

FROM:  U.S. STATE DEPARTMENT 
Proposed Authorization to Use Military Force in Syria
Testimony
John Kerry
Secretary of State
Opening Remarks Before the House Armed Services Committee
Washington, DC
September 10, 2013

Chairman McKeon, Ranking Member Smith, and distinguished members of the committee, I’m privileged to be here this morning with Secretary Hagel and General Dempsey, and we are all of us – all three of us – very much looking forward to a conversation with you about this complicated, challenging, but critical issue that our country faces.

And we don’t come to you lightly. I think Secretary Hagel and I particularly come here with an enormous amount of respect for this process, for what each of you go through at home, and the challenges you face with constituents, and the complexity of this particular issue. So this is good. It’s good that we’re here, and we look forward to the conversation.

And as we convene at this hearing, it is no exaggeration at all to say to you that the world is watching. And they’re watching not just to see what we decide; they’re watching to see how we decide it, and whether or not we have the ability at this critical time when so much is on the line in so many parts of the world. As challenges to governance, writ large, it’s important that we show the world that we actually do have the ability to, hopefully, speak with one voice. And we believe that that can make a difference.

Needless to say, this is one of the most important decisions that any member of Congress makes during the course of their service. And we all want to make sure we leave plenty of time here for discussion. Obviously, this is a very large committee, and so we’ll try to summarize in these comments and give the opportunity for the Q&A.

But I just want to open with a few comments about questions I’m hearing from many of your colleagues, and obviously, from the American people and what we read in the news.

First, people ask me – and they ask you, I know – why we are choosing to have a debate on Syria at a time when there’s so much that we need to be doing here at home. And we all know what that agenda is. Let me assure you, the President of the United States didn’t wake up one day and just kind of flippantly say, “Let’s go take military action in Syria.” He didn’t choose this. We didn’t choose this. We’re here today because Bashar al-Assad, a dictator who has chosen to meet the requests for reform in his country with bullets and bombs and napalm and gas, because he made a decision to use the world’s most heinous weapons to murder more than – in one instance – more than 1,400 innocent people, including more than 400 children. He and his regime made a choice, and President Obama believes – and all of us at this table believe – that we have no choice but to respond.

Now, to those who doubt whether Assad’s actions have to have consequences, remember that our inaction absolutely is guaranteed to bring worse consequences. You, every one of you here – we, all of us – America will face this. If not today, somewhere down the line when the permissiveness of not acting now gives Assad license to go do what he wants – and threaten Israel, threaten Jordan, threaten Lebanon, create greater instability in a region already wracked by instability, where stability is one of the greatest priorities of our foreign policy and of our national security interest.

And that brings me to the second question that I’ve heard lately, which is sort of: What’s really at stake here? Does this really affect us? I met earlier today with Steve Chabot and had a good conversation. I asked him, “What are you hearing?” I know what you’re all hearing. The instant reaction of a lot of Americans anywhere in our country is, “Woah, we don’t want to go to war again. We don’t want to Iraq. We don’t want to go to Afghanistan. We’ve seen how those turned out.” I get it, and I’ll speak to that in a minute.

But I want to make it clear at the outset, as each of us at this table want to make it clear, that what Assad has done directly affects America’s security – America’s security. We have a huge national interest in containing all weapons of mass destruction. And the use of gas is a weapon of mass destruction. Allowing those weapons to be used with impunity would be an enormous chink in our armor that we have built up over years against proliferation. Think about it. Our own troops benefit from that prohibition against chemical weapons.

I mentioned yesterday in the briefing – many of you were there, and some of you I notice from decorations, otherwise I know many of you have served in the military, some of you still in the reserves. And you know the training we used to go through when you’re learning. And I went to Chemical, Nuclear, Biological Warfare school, and I remember going into a room and a gas mask, and they make you take it off, and you see how long you can do it. It ain’t for long.

Those weapons have been outlawed, and our troops, in all of the wars we fought since World War I, have never been subjected to it because we stand up for that prohibition. There’s a reason for that. If we don’t answer Assad today, we will irreparably damage a century-old standard that has protected American troops in war. So to every one of your constituents, if they were to say to you, “Why did you vote for this even though we said we don’t want to go to war?” Because you want to protect American troops, because you want to protect America’s prohibition and the world’s prohibition against these weapons.

The stability of this region is also in our direct security interest. Our allies, our friends in Israel, Jordan, and Turkey, are, all of them, just a strong wind away from being injured themselves or potentially from a purposeful attack. Failure to act now will make this already volatile neighborhood even more combustible, and it will almost certainly pave the way for a more serious challenge in the future. And you can just ask our friends in Israel or elsewhere. In Israel, they can’t get enough gas masks. And there’s a reason that the Prime Minister has said this matters, this decision matters. It’s called Iran. Iran looms out there with its potential – with its nuclear program and the challenge we have been facing. And that moment is coming closer in terms of a decision. They’re watching what we do here. They’re watching what you do and whether or not this means something.

If we choose not to act, we will be sending a message to Iran of American ambivalence, American weakness. It will raise the question – I’ve heard this question. As Secretary of State as I meet with people and they ask us about sort of our long-term interests and the future with respect to Iran, they’ve asked me many times, “Do you really mean what you say? Are you really going to do something?” They ask whether or not the United States is committed, and they ask us also if the President cuts a deal will the Congress back it up? Can he deliver? This is all integrated. I have no doubt – I’ve talked to Prime Minister Netanyahu yesterday – Israel does not want to be in the middle of this. But we know that their security is at risk and the region is at risk.

I also want to remind you, you have already spoken to this. Your word is on the line, too. You passed the Syria Accountability Act. And that act clearly states that Syria’s chemical weapons threaten the security of the Middle East. That’s in plain writing. It’s in the act. You voted for it. We’ve already decided these chemical weapons are important to the security of our nation. I quote, “The national security interests of the United States are – the national security interests of the United States are at risk with the weapons of mass – the chemical weapons of Syria.”

The fourth question I’ve been asked a lot of times is why diplomacy isn’t changing this dynamic. Isn’t there some alternative that could avoid this? And I want to emphasize on behalf of President Obama, President Obama’s first priority throughout this process has been and is diplomacy. Diplomacy is our first resort, and we have brought this issue to the United Nations Security Council on many occasions. We have sent direct messages to Syria, and we’ve had Syria’s allies bring them direct messages: Don’t do this. Don’t use these weapons. All to date, to no avail.

In the last three years, Russia and China have vetoed three Security Council resolutions condemning the regime for inciting violence or resolutions that simply promote a political solution to the dialogue – to the conflict. Russia has even blocked press releases – press releases that do nothing more than express humanitarian concern for what is happening in Syria, or merely condemn the generic use of chemical weapons, not even assigning blame. They have blocked them. We’ve brought these concerns to the United Nations, making the case to the members of the Security Council that protecting civilians, prohibiting the use of chemical weapons, and promoting peace and security are in our shared interests, and those general statements have been blocked.

That is why the President directed me to work with the Russians and the region’s players to get a Geneva 2 peace negotiation underway. And the end to the conflict in Syria, we all emphasize today – is a political solution. None of us are coming to you today asking for a long-term military – I mean, some people think we ought to be, but we don’t believe there is any military solution to what is happening in Syria. But make no mistake: No political solution will ever be achievable as long as Assad believes he can just gas his way out of this predicament. And we are without question building a coalition of support for this now. Thirty-one countries have signed on to the G-20 statement, which is a powerful one, endorsing the United States’ efforts to hold Assad accountable for what he is doing. Turkey, Saudi Arabia, Qatar, France and many others are committed to joining with us in any action. We’re now in the double digits with respect to countries that are prepared to actually take action should they be needed were they capable of it. More than 25 – I mentioned 31 nations signing on to the G-12 statement.

But our diplomatic hand, my former colleagues, our diplomatic hand only becomes stronger if other countries know that America is speaking with a strong voice here, with one voice, and if we’re stronger as a united nation around this purpose. In order to speak with that voice, we need you, the Congress. That’s what the President did. Many of you said please bring this to Congress. The President has done that, and he’s bringing it to Congress with confidence that the Congress will want to join in an effort in order to uphold the word of the United States of America – not just a president, but the United States of America – with respect to these weapons of mass destruction.

Now, I want to be crystal clear about something else. Some people want to do more in Syria; some people are leery about doing anything at all. But one goal we ought to all be able to agree on is that chemical weapons cannot be under the control of a man so craven that he has repeatedly used those chemical weapons against his fellow Syrians with the horrific results that all of us have been able to see.

Yesterday, we challenged the regime to turn them over to the secure control of the international community so that they could be destroyed. And that, of course, would be the ultimate way to degrade and deter Assad’s arsenal, and it is the ideal weapon – ideal way to take this weapon away from him.

Assad’s chief benefactor, the Russians, have responded by saying that they would come up with a proposal to do exactly that. And we have made it clear to them – I have in several conversations with Foreign Minister Lavrov – that this cannot be a process of delay, this cannot be a process of avoidance. It has to be real, has to be measurable, tangible. And it is exceedingly difficult – I want everybody here to know – to fulfill those conditions. But we’re waiting for that proposal, but we’re not waiting for long.

President Obama will take a hard look at it. But it has to be swift, it has to be real, it has to be verifiable. It cannot be a delaying tactic. And if the United Nations Security Council seeks to be the vehicle to make it happen, that cannot be allowed to simply become a debating society. There are many countries – and many of you in the Congress, from those who wanted military action to those who were skeptical of military action – want to see if this idea could become reality.

But make no mistake – make no mistake – about why this idea has any potential legs at all and why it is that the Russians have reached out to the Syrians and why the Syrians have initially suggested they might be interested. A lot of people say that nothing focuses the mind like the prospect of a hanging. Well, it’s the credible threat of force that has been on the table for these last weeks that has, for the first time, brought this regime to even acknowledge that they have a chemical weapons arsenal. And it is the threat of this force and our determination to hold Assad accountable that has motivated others to even talk about a real and credible international action that might have an impact.

So how do you maintain that pressure? We have to continue to show Syria, Russia, and the world that we are not going to fall for stalling tactics. If the challenge we laid down is going to have the potential to become a real proposal, it is only because of the threat of force that we are discussing today. And that threat is more compelling if Congress stands with the Commander-in-Chief.

Finally, let me just correct a common misconception. In my conversation with Steve Chabot earlier today, he mentioned this. I’ve heard it. I’ve talked with many of you. You’ve told you me you hear it. The instant reaction of a lot of Americans – and I am completely sympathetic to it, I understand it, I know where it comes from, I only stopped sitting where you sit a few months ago – I know exactly what the feelings are. People don’t want another Iraq. None of us do. We don’t want Afghanistan.

But Mr. Chairman, with all due respect, we can’t make this decision based solely on the budget. We can’t make this decision based solely on our wishes, on our feeling that we know we’ve been through the ringer for a while. We’re the United States of America, and people look to us. They look to us for the meaning of our word, and they look to us for our values in fact being followed up by the imprint of action where that is necessary.

We are not talking about America going to war. President Obama is not asking for a declaration of war. We are not going to war. There will be no American boots on the ground. Let me repeat: No American boots will be on the ground.

What we’re talking about is a targeted, limited, but consequential action that will reinforce the prohibition against chemical weapons. And General Dempsey and Secretary Hagel will tell you how we can achieve that and their confidence in our ability to achieve that. We’re talking about an action that will degrade Assad’s capacity to use these weapons and to ensure that they do not proliferate. And with this authorization, the President is asking for the power to make sure that the United States of America means what we say.

Mr. Chairman, Mr. Ranking Member, and members of this committee, I can say to you with absolute confidence, the risk of not acting is much greater than the risk of acting. If we fail to act, Assad will believe that he has license to gas his own people again. And that license will turn prohibited weapons into tactical weapons. And General Dempsey can tell you about this. It would make – it would take an exception, a purposeful exception that has been in force since 1925, and make it the rule today. It would undermine our standing, degrade America’s security and our credibility, and erode our strength in the world.

In a world of terrorists and extremists, we would choose to ignore those risks at our peril. We cannot afford to have chemical weapons transformed into the new convenient weapon, the IED, the car bomb, the weapon of everyday use in this world. Neither our country nor our conscience can bear the costs of inaction, and that’s why we’ve come before you, at the instruction of the President, to ask you to join us in this effort.

PRESIDENT OBAMA SAYS STRIKES ON SYRIA ARE JUSTIFIED

FROM:  U.S. DEFENSE DEPARTMENT 
Obama: Syria Strikes Justified, But Diplomacy May Work
By Karen Parrish
American Forces Press Service

WASHINGTON, Sept. 10, 2013 - The credible threat of U.S. military force in Syria is critical to showing the world that chemical weapons use is unacceptable, President Barack Obama said in a speech to the nation tonight, but he added that he has asked Congress to postpone a vote authorizing such action.

The commander in chief noted he has asked U.S. military forces to stay ready to conduct the limited strikes he has proposed, which would aim to reduce Assad's chemical weapons stocks and means of delivering them without putting U.S. boots on the ground.

U.S. officials and others in the international community are now pursuing a last-ditch effort to disarm Bashar Assad's regime of the prohibited weapons, Obama said, including the sarin gas his forces used against Syrian civilians Aug. 21, killing 400 or more children among the more than 1,400 total dead.

"We know the Assad regime was responsible," the president said. "In the days leading up to Aug. 21, we know that Assad's chemical weapons personnel prepared for an attack. ... They distributed gas masks to their troops. Then they fired rockets from a regime-controlled area into 11 neighborhoods that the regime has been trying to wipe clear of opposition forces. Shortly after those rockets landed, the gas spread, and hospitals filled with the dying and the wounded."

Over the past two years, Obama said, "what began as a series of peaceful protests ... has turned into a brutal civil war. Over 100,000 people have been killed. Millions have fled the country."

He has thus far resisted calls for military action, the president said, "because we cannot resolve someone else's civil war through force, particularly after a decade of war in Iraq and Afghanistan."

The Aug. 21 attack changed that calculus, the president said.

"The images from this massacre are sickening: men, women, children lying in rows, killed by poison gas, others foaming at the mouth, gasping for breath," he said. "A father clutching his dead children, imploring them to get up and walk."

The world saw proof "in gruesome detail" of the terrible nature of chemical weapons, Obama said, "and why the overwhelming majority of humanity has declared them off-limits, a crime against humanity and a violation of the laws of war."

Chemical weapons were used in both world wars, the president said. "Because these weapons can kill on a mass scale, with no distinction between soldier and infant, the civilized world has spent a century working to ban them," he added, noting that 189 governments, representing 98 percent of humanity, now prohibit the use of chemical weapons.

Obama said he's cautiously hopeful about current international efforts involving Syria's closest ally, Russia, to remove and ultimately destroy Syria's chemical arsenal. He said he is sending Secretary of State John F. Kerry to meet his Russian counterpart Sept. 12, and that he will continue his own discussions with Russian President Vladimir Putin.

The president said he also has spoken to leaders of France and the United Kingdom, "and we will work together in consultation with Russia and China to put forward a resolution at the U.N. Security Council requiring Assad to give up his chemical weapons and to ultimately destroy them under international control."

The United States will give U.N. inspectors the opportunity to report their findings about what happened Aug. 21, "and we will continue to rally support from allies from Europe to the Americas, from Asia to the Middle East, who agree on the need for action," the president said.

If military strikes are ultimately required, Obama said, they will be decisive.

"The United States military doesn't do pinpricks," he said. "Even a limited strike will send a message to Assad that no other nation can deliver."

The president also expressed his gratitude to U.S. service members and their families. "Tonight I give thanks, again, to our military and their families for their incredible strength and sacrifices," he said.

Obama said he doesn't believe the United States should remove another dictator with force, as it did in Iraq. "But a targeted strike can makes Assad -- or any other dictator -- think twice before using chemical weapons," he added.

U.S. ideals and principles, as well as national security, are at stake in Syria, the president said.

"Terrible things happen across the globe, and it is beyond our means to right every wrong, but when with modest effort and risk we can stop children from being gassed to death and thereby make our own children safer over the long run, I believe we should act," he said.

"That's what makes America different," the president concluded. "That's what makes us exceptional. With humility, but with resolve, let us never lose sight of that essential truth."

Statement by the Press Secretary on the President’s Meeting with Senior Administration Officials on Our Preparedness and Security Posture on the Twelfth Anniversary of September 11th | The White House

Statement by the Press Secretary on the President’s Meeting with Senior Administration Officials on Our Preparedness and Security Posture on the Twelfth Anniversary of September 11th | The White House

NSA MAKES CASE FOR ATTACKING SYRIA

FROM:  U.S. DEFENSE DEPARTMENT
National Security Advisor Makes Case for Action in Syria
By Amaani Lyle
American Forces Press Service

WASHINGTON, Sept. 9, 2013 - National Security Advisor Susan E. Rice today explained the objectives of punitive military strikes under consideration in response to the use of chemical weapons by the Bashar Assad regime against Syrian civilians.

In a speech at the New America Foundation, Rice said President Barack Obama's administration has collaborated with the United Nations, Congress and other allies to isolate the Assad regime, deny its resources, bolster civilian and military opposition and secure diplomatic agreement with other key countries.

"We can and we will stand up for certain principals in this pivotal region," Rice said. "We seek a Middle East where citizens can enjoy their universal rights, live in dignity, freedom and prosperity, choose their own leaders and determine their own future, free from fear, violence and intimidation."

The military action, Rice said, is by no means the sum total of the U.S. policy toward Syria. "Our overarching goal is to end the underlying conflict through a negotiated political transition in which Assad leaves power," she added.

But to this end, the national security advisor said, all parties must be willing to negotiate to avoid more direct action in the region.

"Only after pursuing a wide range of nonmilitary measures to prevent and halt chemical weapons use did President Obama conclude that a limited military strike is the right way to deter Assad from continuing to employ chemical weapons like any conventional weapon of war," she said.

Rice said the lack of a response to the Syrian regime's use of chemical weapons would present several risks.

"Failing to respond means more and more Syrians will die from Assad's poisonous stockpiles," she said. "Failing to respond makes our allies and partners in the region tempting targets of Assad's future attacks."

Risks also include opening the door to other weapons of mass destruction and emboldening those would use them, she said.

"We cannot allow terrorists bent on destruction, or a nuclear North Korea, or an aspiring nuclear Iran to believe for one minute that we are shying away from our determination to back up our long-standing warnings," Rice said. "Failing to respond to this brazen attack could indicate that the United States is not prepared to use the full range of tools necessary to keep our nation secure."

Rice also said inaction could undermine the United States' ability to rally coalitions and lead internationally. "Any president, Republican or Democrat, must have recourse to all elements of American power to design and implement our national security policy, whether diplomatic, economic or military," she said.

The sarin gas used in the Syrian regime's Aug. 21 chemical attack is an odorless and colorless poison undetectable to its victims until it's too late, Rice said, and which targets the body's central nervous system, making every breath a struggle and causing nausea and uncontrollable convulsions.

"The death of any innocent in Syria or around the world is a tragedy, whether by bullet or landmine or poisonous gas," the national security advisor said. "But chemical weapons are different -- they are wholly indiscriminate. Gas plumes shift and spread without warning."

Chemical weapons kill on a scope and scale that is entirely different from conventional weapons, Rice said, adding that their effect is immense and the torturous death they bring is unconscionable.

The Syrian regime has one of the largest stockpiles of chemical weapons in the world, and Assad, Rice said, has been struggling to clear neighborhoods in Damascus and drive out the opposition amid an ever-waning conventional arsenal.

"Assad is lowering his threshold for use while increasing exponentially the lethality of his attacks," Rice said.

Unaddressed, she said, the unrest creates even greater refugee flows and raises the risk that deadly chemicals would spill across borders into neighboring Turkey, Jordan, Lebanon and Iraq, as well as the closest U.S. ally, Israel.

"Every time chemicals weapons are moved, unloaded and used on the battlefield, it raises the likelihood that these weapons will fall into the hands of terrorists active in Syria, including Assad's ally Hezbollah and al-Qaida affiliates," Rice said. "That prospect puts Americans at risk of chemical attacks, targeted at our Soldiers and diplomats in the region and even potentially our citizens at home."

Every attack also serves to unravel the long-established commitment of nations to renounce chemical weapons use, Rice said, specifically 189 countries representing 98 percent of the world's population, which now prohibit development, acquisition or use of these weapons.

CHAIRMAN OF JOINT CHIEFS TESTIFIES BEFORE CONGRESS ABOUT U.S. RESPONSE TO SYRIAN GAS ATTACKS

FROM:  U.S. DEFENSE DEPARTMENT 
Forces Ready for Syria Contingencies, Dempsey Says
By Karen Parrish
American Forces Press Service

WASHINGTON, Sept. 10, 2013 - U.S. forces are positioned and plans are in place for a range of military options against Bashar Assad's regime in Syria, America's top general testified today before the House Armed Services Committee.

Army Gen. Martin E. Dempsey, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, spoke before the committee along with Secretary of State John F. Kerry and Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel on authorization to use military force in Syria, which President Barack Obama has asked Congress to grant.

The general noted that Obama has determined that a limited military response to Assad's use of chemical weapons -- in one instance killing 1,400 Syrians, including some 400 children -- is in America's national security interest. Chemical weapons have long been outlawed under international agreements, one dating back to 1925, that prohibit their assembly, stockpiling or use.

"We've reached the point at which Assad views chemical weapons as just another military tool in his arsenal, a tool he's willing to use indiscriminately," Dempsey said. "And that's what makes this so dangerous -- dangerous for Syria, dangerous for the region, and dangerous for the world."

Dempsey said he has prepared at the president's request a list of target packages to meet the objectives of deterring the Assad regime's further use of chemical weapons and degrading its military capability to deliver chemical weapons.

"We have both an initial target set and subsequent target sets, should they become necessary," the chairman said. "The planned strikes will disrupt those parts of Assad's forces directly related to the chemical attack of 21 August, degrade his means of chemical weapons delivery, and finally, degrade the assets that Assad uses to threaten his neighbors and to defend his regime."

Dempsey added the strikes will send Assad a deterrent message that the United States can "hold at risk the capabilities he values most."

U.S. forces are ready to carry out the orders of the commander in chief, he said. Dempsey acknowledged that because of sequestration-mandated spending cuts, "the force that sits behind the forward-deployed force" faces readiness issues. But a limited operation in Syria to defend the nation's security interests is feasible, he said.

"I am concerned not about [funding] this operation, but in general that unforeseen contingencies will be impacted in the future if sequestration continues," he said.

Dempsey noted the limited nature of the planned strikes should decrease the potential for miscalculation and escalation, as well as minimize collateral damage. "However, we are postured to address a range of contingencies and we're prepared to support our friends in the region should Assad choose to retaliate," he added.

U.S. troops are exceptionally well trained and prepared, the general told the panel. "I'm honored to represent them," he said. "If called to execute, your military will respond."

U.S.-CHINA RELATIONS IN CONSULTATIVE TALKS

FROM:  U.S. DEFENSE DEPARTMENT 
U.S., Chinese Reps Stress Progress in Consultative Talks
American Forces Press Service

WASHINGTON, Sept. 10, 2013 - Defense officials from the United States and China met in Beijing yesterday and discussed how to continue the progress that has taken place in the military relationship between their countries, Pentagon Press Secretary George Little said today.

In a statement summarizing the 14th annual defense consultative talks, Little said James N. Miller, undersecretary of defense for policy, and Lt. Gen. Wang Guanzhong, deputy chief of the People's Liberation Army General Staff, led their respective country's delegations. The U.S. delegation included representatives from the Joint Staff, U.S. Pacific Command, the national security staff and the State Department, he added.

"Miller and Wang underscored the accomplishments that the U.S.-China military-to-military relationship has achieved thus far this year," the press secretary said. "They discussed how to sustain the positive momentum in building a constructive military relationship and advance a new model of military-to-military relations into the future."

In this regard, he added, the two agreed to further the exploration of the two proposals on military confidence building offered in June by Chinese President Xi Jinping during a two-day working meeting in California with President Barack Obama.

"The two leaders discussed how to enhance strategic trust and build upon opportunities to expand cooperation in areas of mutual interest, including humanitarian assistance, disaster relief, peacekeeping and maritime safety," Little said. "They also discussed ways to enhance communications to improve understanding and avoid misperception."

Both agreed to continue discussions between maritime legal experts, the press secretary said, and to sustain dialogue in key strategic areas including nuclear, missile defense, space and cyber. The two sides also exchanged views on the East and South China Sea, Little said.

Miller emphasized the significant U.S. concerns regarding North Korea's nuclear and missile developments, Little said, and called on China to maintain and increase pressure on North Korea "to bring the regime back to credible and authentic negotiations aimed at denuclearization

THE RESPONDERS ON THE CRISIS LINE

FROM:  U.S. DEFENSE DEPARTMENT
Responder Demystifies Calling Military Crisis Line for Help
By Terri Moon Cronk
American Forces Press Service

WASHINGTON, Sept. 9, 2013 - When someone is in crisis and feeling despondent, reaching out for help is a stronger step to take than doing nothing, which can lead to a worsening state, a Military Crisis Line responder told American Forces Press Service today.

Tricia Lucchesi of Canandaigua, N.Y., said she encourages service members, families, veterans and friends to feel comfortable calling the crisis line.

She said people contact the crisis line to discuss a variety of issues, from feeling suicidal, depressed or anxious to feeling pressure from finances or relationships, among a wealth of other concerns.

"I want to encourage people to reach out, day or night, any day of the year," Lucchesi said. "Our veterans and service members that do the best are the ones who make those calls."

To reach skilled responders who are knowledgeable of military culture, dial 1-800-273-8255 and press No. 1. The crisis line also is available by cell-phone text by dialing 838255, or through online chat at http://www.veteranscrisisline.net/ActiveDuty.aspx.

Lucchesi said callers can expect a live person and not an electronic menu to answer their calls.

People can call the crisis line to speak with trained professionals about their problem safely, anonymously and confidentially, "which is really important," Lucchesi said.

"We stay on the phone for as long as it takes," she added. "We'll do whatever we need to do to get that person the help that he needs," she added.

Callers receive a follow-up call from a suicide prevention coordinator the next day, or another professional who's linked into the crisis line team. A "compassionate callback," follows about 10 days afterward, Lucchesi said, to make sure the callers connected with the services they needed, and so responders can make sure callers are feeling better.

While some service members hesitate to seek help because they fear it will have a negative impact their military career, Lucchesi advises them to make the call to the crisis line before matters worsen.

"Military people do worry about [career impact], but if they're getting to the point where they're so much in crisis, they need to call us," she said. "It becomes imperative for us to get them help, [and] if they don't call, their military career could be at risk."

The Military Crisis Line, also known as the Veterans Crisis Line at the same phone and text numbers, is a joint effort between the Defense and Veterans Affairs departments. It provides worldwide services for active duty troops, veterans, family members and concerned friends of those in crisis, Lucchesi said.

"Suicide has become such a prominent issue, the [departments] are working closely together to create a system to assist our members without them having to worry about their careers or confidentiality," she said.

As the nation observes Suicide Prevention and Awareness Month, Lucchesi said, she wants people to know they will find a welcoming environment of helpful responders who will stay on the phone with a caller until a "safety plan" is in place. A safety plan varies by individual, she explained, but can typically involve callers committing to seeking suggested help and various resources, and taking other actions such as securing weapons and pills that could be used to take one's life.

"Just agreeing with somebody that they can do that, and knowing they're going to get some help takes away some of the hopeless feelings they have," she said. "Isolation is an issue for many of our veterans, service members and their families. We're here 24/7, and we never want anyone to feel alone. They don't have to sit in emotional turmoil all by themselves."

Responders don't want veterans or military personnel to become suicidal, Lucchesi said. "We much prefer that they call us when they're in crisis so we can point them to services. We don't want to risk losing any of them," she added. "Any person who calls the crisis line has the choice about how much information they want to share".

The only time an anonymous call could require more identifying information is when the need for help delves further, but only when the caller gives permission to link to such resources, Lucchesi noted.

DOD leadership has for several years worked to remove the perceived stigma attached to seeking mental health help. Lucchesi said she hopes a reduced stigma is why the crisis line has produced an increase in calls, chats and texts. Yet, there are other reasons why contacting the crisis line has increased, she said.

"People who have used the line learned we're not just going to send rescue out to them. They can call here for all kinds of reasons, and if they can [set up a] safety plan, they don't have to worry about a policeman or emergency services showing up at their door," Lucchesi said.

"We're very aware that [such actions] can cause a financial burden, increase stigma, and be a problem for some people," she added, but noted that it crisis line responders are concerned someone is about to take his or her life, emergency services might be necessary.

Lucchesi emphasized the importance of contacting the crisis line – by calling, texting or chatting, whichever is more comfortable for a person in crisis.

"Someone could call here totally hopeless and have no reason at all to live," she said. "And if we're doing our job well, by the time that call ends, they're feeling differently."

U.S.-CHINA MILITARY-TO-MILITARY RELATIONS

FROM:  U.S. DEFENSE DEPARTMENT
Readout of the U.S.-China Defense Consultative Talks
Pentagon Press Secretary George Little provided the following readout:


Officials from the United States and China met Sept. 9, 2013 in Beijing for the 14th annual Defense Consultative Talks. Dr. James Miller, undersecretary of defense for policy, and Lt. Gen. Wang Guanzhong, deputy chief of the People's Liberation Army General Staff, led their respective country's delegations. The U.S. delegation included representatives from the Joint Staff, U.S. Pacific Command, the National Security Staff and the State Department.



Miller and Wang underscored the accomplishments that the U.S.-China military-to-military relationship has achieved thus far this year. They discussed how to sustain the positive momentum in building a constructive military relationship and advance a new model of military-to-military relations into the future. In this regard, the two agreed to further the exploration of the two proposals on military confidence building offered by President Xi at Sunnylands.



The two leaders discussed how to enhance strategic trust and build upon opportunities to expand cooperation in areas of mutual interest, including humanitarian assistance, disaster relief, peacekeeping, and maritime safety. They also discussed ways to enhance communications to improve understanding and avoid misperception. Both agreed to continue discussions between maritime legal experts, and sustain dialogue in key strategic areas including nuclear, missile defense, space, and cyber.



The two sides also exchanged views on the East and South China Sea. On North Korea, Miller emphasized the significant concerns of the United States regarding North Korea's nuclear and missile developments and called on China to maintain and increase pressure on North Korea to bring the regime back to credible and authentic negotiations aimed at denuclearization.

Tans all over America

Tans all over America

CDC SAYS 100,000 AMERICANS QUIT SMOKING BECAUSE OF MEDIA CAMPAIGN

FROM:  CENTERS FOR DISEASE CONTROL AND PREVENTION
CDC Press Release: More than 100,000 Americans quit smoking due to national media campaign
Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) sent this bulletin at 09/09/2013 10:20 AM EDT
Press Release

More than 100,000 Americans quit smoking due to national media campaign
Landmark tobacco education ad campaign more than doubled goals
An estimated 1.6 million smokers attempted to quit smoking because of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s “Tips From Former Smokers” national ad campaign, according to a study released by the CDC. As a result of the 2012 campaign, more than 200,000 Americans had quit smoking immediately following the three-month campaign, of which researchers estimated that more than 100,000 will likely quit smoking permanently. These results exceed the campaign’s original goals of 500,000 quit attempts and 50,000 successful quits.
The study surveyed thousands of adult smokers and nonsmokers before and after the campaign. Findings showed that, by quitting, former smokers added more than a third of a million years of life to the U.S. population. The Tips campaign, which aired from March 19 to June 10, 2012, was the first time a federal agency had developed and placed paid advertisements for a national tobacco education campaign. Ads featured emotionally powerful stories of former smokers living with smoking-related diseases and disabilities. The campaign encouraged people to call 1-800-QUIT-NOWCall: 1-800-QUIT-NOW, a toll-free number to access quit support across the country, or visit a quit-assistance website. The study on the campaign’s impact is published today by a medical journal, The Lancet.

“This is exciting news. Quitting can be hard and I congratulate and celebrate with former smokers - this is the most important step you can take to a longer, healthier life,” said CDC Director Tom Frieden, M.D., M.P.H. “I encourage anyone who tried to quit to keep trying – it may take several attempts to succeed.’’
The study found that millions of nonsmokers reported talking to friends and family about the dangers of smoking and referring smokers to quit services. Almost 80 percent of smokers and almost 75 percent of non-smokers recalled seeing at least one of the ads during the three-month campaign.

REMARKS BY SECRETARY OF STATE KERRY AND U.K. FOREIGN SECRETARY HAGUE

FROM:  U.S. STATE DEPARTMENT 
Remarks With United Kingdom Foreign Secretary Hague
Remarks
John Kerry
Secretary of State
United Kingdom Foreign and Commonwealth Office
London, United Kingdom
September 9, 2013

FOREIGN SECRETARY HAGUE: Good morning, ladies and gentlemen. It’s a great pleasure to host my great friend and colleague, John Kerry, here in the Foreign and Commonwealth Office once again.

Of course, we have spent most of our time discussing the crisis in Syria. But I want to begin by paying tribute to Secretary Kerry for his work on the Middle East peace process, which has now led to the resumption of direct negotiations between Israel and the Palestinians. This is a reminder, amidst all the difficulties of the whole Middle Eastern region, of the progress that effective diplomacy can offer. And I will meet President Abbas here in London later today.

The UK will do all it can to provide support to this process. And I will remain in close touch, as we always do, with Secretary Kerry on this in the coming weeks. Achieving a two-state solution in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict is a very, very high priority in foreign affairs, and John Kerry has placed it there and given enormous energy to this in the last few months.

We’ve discussed all aspects of the crisis in Syria. The position of the United Kingdom, following our parliamentary vote 10 days ago is well known, and the government – as you know, in the government, we fully respect the decision made by the House of Commons. But our objectives and efforts between the UK and the U.S. remain closely aligned in four areas in particular: first, working to create the conditions for a Geneva 2 peace process that can lead to a transitional government in Syria; secondly, addressing the desperate humanitarian situation; third, supporting the moderate Syrian opposition and saving lives on the ground; and fourth, mustering a strong international response to the use of chemical weapons.

Our government supports the objective of ensuring there can be no impunity for the first use of chemical warfare in the 21st century. As an international community, we must deter further attacks and hold those responsible for them accountable. We admire the leadership of President Obama and of Secretary Kerry, himself, in making his case so powerfully to the world. This week the European Union, the Arab League, and many of the countries of the G-20 have called for a strong international response. And it is to the credit of the United States that, once again, they are prepared to lead such efforts. They have the full diplomatic support of the United Kingdom. And I welcome the fact that an increasing number of countries have signed up to the joint statement on Syria adopted last week during the G-20 by 11 countries during the G-20, and I urge other countries to do the same.

Secretary Kerry and I share the same revulsion at the utter callousness of a regime that has presided over the deaths of more than 100,000 people and caused more than 2 million to become refugees, among them a million children. The Prime Minister announced an additional 52 million pounds in humanitarian assistance last week, bringing our total to 400 million pounds. The United Kingdom will be working intensively over the coming weeks, including at the UN, to try to secure unfettered access for aid inside Syria, and to address the aid shortfall, working closely with the United States, which is working, leading by example here, as in many other areas.

I briefed Secretary Kerry on the talks we held last week with the presidents and senior leadership of the Syrian National Coalition. There can’t be a political solution in Syria if the Assad regime is allowed to eradicate the moderate opposition. So we discussed ways in which we will continue to coordinate our assistance to them, and we reaffirmed our commitment to a Geneva 2 peace conference, which should create a transitional government leading to elections in Syria, and to continuing our diplomacy with Russia to try to bring about the necessary breakthrough.

At its heart, the U.S.-UK special relationship is an alliance of values, values of freedom, of maintaining international peace and security, of making sure that we live in a rules-based world. So the United Kingdom will continue to work closely with the United States, taking a highly active role in addressing the Syria crisis, and working with our closest ally over the coming weeks and months.

And, as well as addressing all these immediate challenges and crises, we continue to work together on a whole range of issues, from the Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership, to Somalia, to my work on preventing sexual violence in conflict, which the Secretary has strongly supported, and, of course, deepening the economic ties that are indispensable to both nations.

So, John, you’re welcome, as always, in London here. And, please, will you say a few words, as well?

SECRETARY KERRY: Thank you, William. I’d be delighted to. And I begin by saying thank you to you for another generous welcome here in London. I’m very grateful to you and the government for all of your efforts. And I’m very pleased to be concluding this morning, before I go back to brief Congress this afternoon on the subject of Syria, to be concluding here in London a very productive and fairly quick trip to Europe over the last couple of days. Particularly grateful to you, William, always, for your great hospitality and your personal friendship. And I thank you for that.

The relationship – well, let me just say also last night I had dinner and a long meeting with President Abbas, whom the Secretary will be meeting with shortly. And it was a very productive and informative session as part of our ongoing efforts in the Middle East peace process. The negotiators are negotiating. We have said we’re not going to discuss the substance on an ongoing basis, and we’re not. But I am encouraged that even though there have been difficulties along the way on both sides in their countries – in their territory and in the country – nevertheless, they are staying at it, and they are not allowing what historically have been disruptions that might have interrupted them from doing so at this time. That encourages me, in terms of the determination and purpose. And so we will continue this process thoughtfully and, hopefully, quietly over the course of the next weeks and months.

The relationship between the United States and the United Kingdom has often been described as special, essential. And it has been described thusly, quite simply, because it is. It was before a vote the other day in parliament, and it will be for long afterwards after that vote. Our bond, as William has just said, is bigger than one vote; it’s bigger than one moment in history. It’s about values. It’s about rules of the road, rules by which human beings try to organize their societies and offer people maximum freedom and opportunity, respecting rights, and finding a balance in a very complicated world. And we have no better partner in that effort than Great Britain, and we are grateful for that.

Our bond really is a paradigm for international cooperation. And our work together on global issues to ensure peace, to ensure stability, to create economic prosperity, to help others to share in the values that we share, to engage in humanitarian initiatives around the world, and sometimes to stand together against the oppressive steps that tyrants take, all of those things are what tie us together, not just for our two nations, but for the entire world.

So just a few minutes ago, the Foreign Secretary and I spoke about the importance of our continued cooperation on a full range of issues, from climate change, to the pursuit of peace between the Israelis and the Palestinians, to our counterterrorism efforts, to our efforts to promote democracy on a global basis, and, of course, to our efforts to bring about an end to the civil war in Syria.

As I drove in here this morning, there were a group of people assembled outside the building, as is their right, and as people should assemble. And some of them – I heard them saying, “Keep your hands off Syria.” I certainly appreciate the feelings in our country, too, about people who have strong feelings about war and strong feelings about not going into yet some other engagement in another part of the world.

But I think it would be good to hear people saying to a dictator, “Keep your hands off chemical weapons that kill your own people. Protect your own people.” I think it’s important for us to stand up as nations for civility and against actions that challenge notions of humanity and decency and appropriate international behavior. And for almost 100 years, the world has stood together against the use of chemical weapons, and we need to hear an appropriate outcry as we think back on those moments of history when large numbers of people have been killed because the world was silent. The Holocaust, Rwanda, other moments are lessons to all of us today.

So let me be clear. The United States of America, President Obama, myself, others are in full agreement that the end of the conflict in Syria requires a political solution. There is no military solution. And we have no illusions about that. But a resolution to this has to come about because the parties are prepared to come and negotiate that political solution. And if one party believes that it can rub out countless numbers of his own citizens with impunity using chemicals that have been banned for nearly 100 years because of what Europe learned in World War I, if he can do that with impunity, he will never come to a negotiating table. A resolution will not be found on the battlefield, but at that negotiating table. But we have to get to that table.

And we’re in full agreement with our British friends that the humanitarian situation is obviously dire and growing worse: 5 million people displaced within Syria itself; numbers of refugees fleeing from that gas into Lebanon, into Jordan, providing an incredible burden to each of those countries and others in the region. This is a humanitarian catastrophe of global proportions. And the world needs to focus on it, pay attention to it, or we give license to other dictators or other groups in other parts of the world to engage in similar behavior, and just make things worse for everybody.

The United States is proud to say we’ve been the largest humanitarian donor. We recognize that responsibility. And we are also proud to say that we stand with our friends here in Great Britain, who are the second-largest donor. So, we don’t come to this with a sense that all we care about is some kind of a military response. We come to this with years now of effort – literally years of effort – to try to bring the parties to the table and create some kind of political solution, because that remains our top priority. I – our respective leaders made it clear in St. Petersburg that we believe a strong international response is necessary to ensure that atrocities like the one that Assad committed against hundreds of his own people are not going to happen again.

And our special relationship with the UK is not just about Syria, it’s not just about a response to this humanitarian crisis. It’s also about the future, in many ways, on climate change, and particularly on economic prosperity for all of our people. We’re not only – we are both committed to trying to move forward on a trade relationship to grow jobs for our people. And we are not only each other’s largest investors in each of our countries, one to the other, but the fact is that every day almost one million people go to work in America for British companies that are in the United States, just as more than one million people go to work here in Great Britain for American companies that are here. So we are enormously tied together, obviously. And we are committed to making both the U.S.-UK and the U.S.-EU relationships even stronger drivers of our prosperity.

Now, last month the United States held the first round of the negotiations for the Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership. And this is something where we will continue to work closely together, because we both believe that working with the UK and the rest of the EU to finalize an agreement is going to create new investments to add to those millions of people in both countries I just talked about. It’ll create new jobs and it will create growth on both sides of the Atlantic.

So, as Margaret Thatcher put it pretty bluntly, as she did, the UK and the U.S. are real and true friends. And our relationship, which is grounded in those values and traditions that we both referred to, remains as relevant today as it has been in the past. And we look forward to continuing to strengthen this relationship, and working hard to make real progress on the very many challenges that we face in an increasingly complicated and, in too many places, dangerous world. Thank you, William.

FOREIGN SECRETARY HAGUE: Thank you very much indeed, John. Now we’re going to have a couple of questions from each side of the Atlantic. Carl, you’ll pick them out.

QUESTION: James Robbins from BBC News. Mr. Secretary, how seriously do you take the new threats from President Assad of retaliation, including by his allies, if the U.S. does strike? That risks, doesn’t it, dragging the United States further into the conflict?

And if Britain had said yes rather than no to strikes, the President would have ordered them by now, wouldn’t he? You’ve now adopted a different tactic, building a different sort of coalition using powerful moral arguments for action against inaction. The logic of that, surely, is that whatever the votes in Congress, the President will go ahead with strikes. The votes can’t change his moral position.

SECRETARY KERRY: Well, I’m not surprised to find here a well-put question that basically tries to get me to answer something that the President hasn’t decided. So I just have to tell you that the President made a decision based on his gut and his best sense of what was best for the United States of America and our Congress and our democracy. And he knew it would be tough. He didn’t – there was no misinterpretation of the vote here. I think that’s why the President made a very courageous decision to go to the Congress, notwithstanding what happened here, recognizing that in our democracy it was important to ask for the Congress to also invest in this effort.

And I can’t tell you that if the vote had been different the President would have made a different decision at all. I think he was thinking about the best way to proceed, and he made his decision about the best way to proceed. I’m confident the Congress is going to listen very, very carefully. It is listening carefully. Members are doing their homework, their diligence here. There’ve been a lot of briefings in the course of the last week. We will have a full House briefing later today that I will take part in, a full Senate briefing tomorrow. I believe the President will then talk to the American people.

But what I think is important here – I met with a friend of mine, who is a member of the British parliament, who was telling me that even here, still, there are some people who question the evidence, who aren’t sure that, in the post-Iraq moment, we’re not going to be confronting a pre-Iraq presentation. And there’s a lot of fear of that. I understand that fear. I was in the Congress when we voted on Iraq. And I know the deficits of the intelligence back then. And that’s why we took our time very, very carefully. Secretary Chuck Hagel was Senator Hagel, as I was Senator Kerry. And both of us are determined now, as appointed officials of the Obama Administration, to do our utter best not to have history suggest that we were less than thorough with respect to this intelligence.

So we took more time. The President instructed that he wanted this story told as fully as was possible without compromising intelligence sources and methods. The intelligence community was instructed to release more information than we ever have previously in this kind of a situation. And so we declassified things that normally would not be declassified. And there’s a risk in that. But the risk of not having people understand the full measure of the evidence, I think, the President decided was greater.

So what have we put out to people? What do we know about this? Notwithstanding President Assad’s interview, which has not yet been made fully public, we know that his regime gave orders to prepare for a chemical attack. We know that they deployed forces and put them in the places where this took place. We know, by tracing it physically, where the rockets came from, and where they landed. And it is no accident that they all came from regime-controlled territory, and all landed in opposition-controlled or contested territory. We know this. We know that within moments of them landing in that territory, the social media exploded with videos that we also know could not be contrived. And we’ve done various means of ascertaining that through technology check-up. So we know that those are real, and we see people dying, children, young kids not old enough to even speak, heaving for breath, spasming, struggling. And we see all of that within instants of this happening in the very area that we traced that the rockets landed.

Then we hear and know the regime is issuing more instructions to stop the attack, and we know they issue instructions to their people that they’re worried about the UN inspectors finding out what was going on. And then they shell the area that was attacked for four days with four times – the – I can’t remember the exact number of shells that had occurred in the previous 10 days. And we also know, through confirmation through other technical means with other countries, acknowledgement this happened. Syria and Iran have admitted there was a chemical attack. They just try to blame it on people who have no scientific capacity to do this, and where there is no evidence that they have any of the weaponry to be able to do it. And, most importantly, just as a matter of logic, tell me how they would do it from the center of the regime-controlled area and put it into their own people. It defies logic. It defies common sense here.

So, the evidence is powerful. And the question for all of us is: What are we going to do about it? Turn our backs? Have a moment of silence, where a dictator can, with impunity, threaten the rest of the world that he’s going to retaliate for his own criminal activity because he’s being held accountable? We live in a dangerous world, as it is, folks. And that kind of threat is nothing different from the threat we face every single day. And if we don’t stand up to it, we’ll face it more, and they will think they can intimidate anybody. I don’t believe that we should shy from this moment. The risk of not acting is greater than the risk of acting. And everybody needs to stop and think about that hard.

FOREIGN SECRETARY HAGUE: And let me just add to that before the next question, and I think Secretary Kerry makes – I think the logic of what he says about the evidence is very, very compelling. But on the BBC’s question also about the latest remarks of President Assad, we mustn’t fall into the trap of attaching too much credibility to the words of a leader, President Assad, who has presided over so many war crimes and crimes against humanity, has shown such a murderous disregard for the welfare of his own people, often denied events that have happened, refused in the past to admit the existence of chemical weapons now acknowledged. So let’s not fall into the trap of believing every word that comes out of the mouth of such a man.

Next question?

MODERATOR: Margaret Brennan from CBS.

QUESTION: Thank you. Mr. Secretary, in that CBS interview that you just referenced, Bashar al-Assad said that the presentation that you’ve made reminds him, quote, his words, “of the big lie that Colin Powell said in front of the world about weapons of mass destruction in Iraq.” He says you personally have presented no evidence of a chemical weapons attack, just your confidence and your convictions. And he disputes the argument you just laid out, his argument saying his government relies on reality, not social media, and says Russian intelligence contradicts this false evidence. What is your response?

And secondly, is there anything at this point that his government could do or offer that would stop an attack?

SECRETARY KERRY: Sure. He could turn over every single bit of his chemical weapons to the international community in the next week. Turn it over, all of it, without delay, and allow a full and total accounting for that. But he isn’t about to do it, and it can’t be done, obviously.

But with respect to the credibility issue, look, I just answered that. I just gave you real evidence, evidence that, as a former prosecutor in the United States, I could tell you I can take into a courtroom and get admitted. And I believe this man – I mean, I’ve personally tried people who have gone away for long prison sentences or for life for less evidence than we have of this. So I’m confident about the state of the evidence.

You can go to whitehouse.gov, read the unclassified report, and make your own judgments. What does he offer? Words that are contradicted by facts. And he doesn’t have a very strong record with respect to this question of credibility, because I personally visited him once at the instruction of the White House to confront him on his transfer of Scud missiles to Hezbollah, which we knew had taken place and had all kinds of facts, and he sat there and simply denied it to my face, notwithstanding the evidence I presented and what we showed him.

So this is a man who has just killed, through his regime, over 1,000 of his own citizens. Over 100,000, or about 100,000, have been murdered over the course of the last months. He sent Scud missiles into schools. He sends airplanes to napalm children. Everybody has seen that. This is a man without credibility. And so I will happily stand anywhere in the world with the evidence that we have against his words and his deception and his acts.

FOREIGN SECRETARY HAGUE: Okay. Third question?

MODERATOR: (Off mike.)

QUESTION: Mr. Secretary, despite all of that evidence and all of the rhetoric you’ve deployed, the American voters, the British voters, and the French voters all opposed to military action in Syria. Why do you think that is? And what makes you think that you know better?

SECRETARY KERRY: Well, I would never claim personally to, quote, “know better.” There’s a certain arrogance in that that I learned long ago in American elected life is not – doesn’t serve you very well. But I would say that a lot of folks have a visceral reaction to public people presenting evidence post-Iraq, where they have serious doubts without sort of seeing all of the evidence, and not everybody has or does.

And also, there’s just an instant reaction by a lot of people to say, “Whoa, here we go again. This is going to be Iraq, this is going to be Afghanistan.” And I understand that. I am very sympathetic to that feeling. If I weren’t in the Administration and I didn’t have access to what I have, I’m sure I would have the exact same reaction. I’d probably be very questioning of public people. That’s why I’m standing up here today. That’s why I went to the European community. That’s why I will be briefing Congress, together with other members of the Administration. That’s why the President will talk to the American people. Because our responsibility is to share what we know, and to lead, and to try to bring people to a point where they can agree with us, hopefully.

Now, I believe that the aftermath of the Iraq experience and Afghanistan leave a lot of people saying, "We don’t want to see our young people coming back in a body bag," and so forth. But that’s not what we’re talking about. And what we have to do is make clear to people that this is – we’re not talking about war. We’re not going to war. We will not have people at risk in that way. We will be able to hold Bashar Assad accountable without engaging in troops on the ground or any other prolonged kind of effort in a very limited, very targeted, very short-term effort that degrades his capacity to deliver chemical weapons without assuming responsibility for Syria’s civil war. That is exactly what we’re talking about doing – unbelievably small, limited kind of effort.

Now, that has been engaged in previously on many different occasions. President Reagan had a – several hours or whatever effort to send a message to Qadhafi in the wake, I think, of Pan Am 103 and other terrorist activities. Other times people have engaged in making it clear that you’ve got to draw a line, and that there are consequences for actions when people step over those lines. If you don’t draw those lines, and the civilized world is not prepared to enforce those lines, you are giving complete license to people to do whatever they want and to feel that they can do so with impunity. If you want to send Iran and Hezbollah and Assad a congratulatory message, you guys can do what you want. You’d say – don’t do anything. We believe that’s dangerous. And we will face this down the road in some more significant way if we’re not prepared to take some kind of a stand now.

So that’s our argument. It’s not that I know better or someone knows better. It’s an argument that we believe is based on fact, on evidence, on history. And we ask people to take a close look at it and make their own judgments.

FOREIGN SECRETARY HAGUE: One more question from the American media.

MODERATOR: Michael Gordon from The New York Times.

QUESTION: Yes, a question for Mr. Hague, the Foreign Secretary: Sir, now that the British parliament has decided against British participation in a potential military strike in Syria, is there any way in which your government might do more in Syria by, say, arming the opposition or upgrading nonlethal material assistance to the rebels? Or, in deference to public opinion at home and your parliament’s decision, is your government essentially relegated to standing on the sidelines and providing moral support?

And, sir, would you support military action by the Obama Administration, even if the American Congress does not vote for that action?

And then a question for Secretary Kerry: Sir, would the Obama Administration consider releasing still more intelligence, or perhaps some of the physical evidence of sarin use, which you have not yet provided, to counter Mr. Assad’s assertions? And is there any concrete intelligence that links Mr. Assad directly to the attack? Do you have such information or not? And do you think it matters if you don’t have such information? Thank you.

FOREIGN SECRETARY HAGUE: On the first part of that question, you can gather from some of my opening remarks that the UK is heavily engaged in many other ways in trying to address the problems of the – thrown up by the crisis in Syria. The Prime Minister convened the meeting at the G-20 of nations and organizations looking at how we seriously ramp up the humanitarian assistance, renew diplomatic efforts on getting humanitarian access, which has been one of the great problems. This is a regime that actually tries to prevent humanitarian aid getting to its own people; in some cases, removes medical supplies or obstructs medical supplies from getting to the right place.

So, the Prime Minister convened that meeting with the strong support of the United States. We have led the way in the latest round of increased donations to the humanitarian effort with that extra 52 million pounds. So the UK is at the forefront, with the United States and others, of that piece of work. And it will become all the more important in the coming months.

We’re also doing a great deal to assist the stability of neighboring countries, and particularly Lebanon and Jordan, and the direct assistance we give to the Lebanese armed forces and to Jordan, including equipment to help the Jordanian armed forces cope on their border. We are heavily engaged at the United Nations and in all forums in the continuous efforts over recent months to bring about a Geneva 2 peace process.

And with the opposition with the Syrian National Coalition, who I met last week, and who I – who we can regard – who I – we can regard as a democratic, non-sectarian opposition, we do give them a great deal of practical, nonlethal assistance. That has included the delivery in recent days of equipment to protect against chemical attack, escape hoods, injections, detector paper that will help people to survive chemical attacks. We’re looking at doing more of that in the future.

And so, as you can see, the United Kingdom is, in very many ways, trying to bring about a – working with the United States and our other allies – trying to bring about a political solution in Syria and alleviate the suffering of the people there and prevent the spread of the crisis to other countries. So involving all of those ways, while fully respecting the vote in our parliament, on our attitude to a decision of the United States, that is for United States. We have our own constitution and parliamentary complications and rules. We will leave it to the United States to address their issues. These are two – the two great homes, two of the greatest homes of democracy in the world, and they each work in slightly different ways. And that – we each have to respect the way each other’s democracy works. And we do.

John?

SECRETARY KERRY: And we do. That’s for sure. I don’t know – honestly, I just don’t know whether the President will make a decision to release more, whether there is a consensus that more needs to be released. We have released an unprecedented amount of information. And obviously, there is a risk in some of this, because you can conceivably, in certain circumstances, compromise your ability to be able to intercept a plot or track what terrorists are thinking about and planning. And so you have to be very, very careful in those judgments, and that’s exactly what the intelligence community – that’s why it took a while to get to where we are.

But – and this is very, very important – but the elected representatives of the American people, members of Congress, have a right to go to the intelligence committees and to the intelligence community and be briefed. So it’s not being hidden from people. And they can be the judges of that additional intelligence that they see or don’t see, which is how a republic works.

With respect to Assad directly, et cetera, the chemical weapons in Syria we have tracked for some period of time now are controlled in a very tight manner by the Assad regime. And it is Bashar al-Assad and Maher al-Assad, his brother, and a general who are the three people who have control over the movement and use of chemical weapons. But under any circumstances, the Assad regime is the Assad regime. And the regime issues orders. And we have high-level regime that have been caught giving these instructions and engaging in these preparations with results going directly to President Assad. And we’re aware of that.

So we have no issue about the question here of responsibility. There is none. The Assad regime is the Assad regime. They control these weapons. They have a huge stock of these weapons, a very threatening level stock that remains. And that’s why this issue is of such consequence and so important. And there is no issue whatsoever in the mind of the intelligence community or the Administration, or certainly in the minds of all those people like Senator Feinstein, who is the head of the Intelligence Committee and Saxby Chambliss, the ranking member, and others who have come to a conclusion that the regime, in fact, engaged in this activity.

FOREIGN SECRETARY HAGUE: Thank you very much, ladies and gentlemen.

SECRETARY KERRY: Thank you very much. Appreciate it.

CENTCOM PROGRAM CENTERS ON BRIDGING SCIENTIFIC AND TECHNOLOGICAL GAPS

FROM:  U.S. DEFENSE DEPARTMENT
Centcom Program Bridges Scientific, Technological Gaps
By Donna Miles
American Forces Press Service

WASHINGTON, Sept. 9, 2013 - Step onto an elevator beside Martin Drake, U.S. Central Command's chief science and technology advisor, and one might be surprised to hear him deliver to perfect strangers an unclassified tutorial he calls "Science and Technology 101."

The impromptu briefing completed, Drake is known to cajole his unsuspecting "students" into raising their right hands so he can deputize them as "honorary deputy science advisors for U.S. Central Command."

"I tell them, 'It takes a village to be the best and to be able to understand where technology is going,'" said Drake, who runs Centcom's dozen-member Science and Technology Division. "We can't do this by ourselves, and we need their help."

The elevator encounters are just one example of the team's unrelenting quest to identify better ways to support warfighters in the command's demanding and complex area of operations. The office members, an eclectic mix of active-duty forces, military retirees and civilian employees, scour the Internet, professional journals and technology expositions to seek out new and emerging technology-related capabilities, Drake told American Forces Press Service.

That boils down to taking gaps and requirements as identified by U.S. forces and partner nations in the theater, converting them into technical requirements, then going out to the science and technology community for solutions. It's a search that begins with the Defense Department's own advanced technology arms -- among them the Office of the Secretary of Defense's Rapid Fielding Directorate; the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency; the Army Research, Development and Engineering Command; the Office of Naval Research; and the Air Force Research Laboratory.

But it extends across the interagency, industrial, academic and international scientific and technological communities.

One staffer frequently visits businesses, garages, anywhere he might stumble on "that piece of technology that might not otherwise be discovered through normal Department of Defense processes," Drake said. Others are dedicated to analyzing the technologies they discover or that others bring to them to identify how it might translate to capability on the ground.

"We are looking for things that might fill the gaps and seams between our military departments in supporting forces in our operational battle space," Drake explained. "We are looking for that unique approach that may not be discovered or headed toward being discovered by the Department of Defense."

Centcom's effort, similar to those at U.S. Pacific Command and U.S. Southern Command, focuses on requirements specific to its geographic area of operations. The idea, Drake explained, is to be able to look across the vast research and development programs taking place within military, government, private and international sectors.

"We think we have a unique perspective," he said. "We are looking across the Army, Navy, Air Force, Marines and our coalition partners. Because we are not tied to any one service approach, we look to see how we can bring them together, and what it might take to make it better." When a concept appears particularly promising, he added, Centcom promotes it through the Defense Department's research, development and acquisition channels.

"I characterize myself as a venture capitalist with no capital," Drake said. "I don't have any money, and U.S. Central Command is not an acquisition authority." All acquisitions in support of Centcom operations are funded by the Office of the Secretary of Defense, the Joint Staff and the military services, he noted.

"So what I do is advocate for potential solutions," Drake said. "And through that advocacy, we try to help maneuver promising technology through our developmental and acquisition processes."

This approach has promoted far-ranging technologies that have proven to be winners on the battlefield. For example, Centcom's Science and Technology Division was a major advocate of the technologies used for battlefield forensics and biometric identification. Both are considered invaluable for warfighters operating against adversaries who don't wear military uniforms and often operate in the shadows.

"These have become absolute tools for our forces forward, to help them sort out the who's who in the battle space," Drake said.

But the division doesn't limit its scope to technologies, Drake emphasized. "We're also looking at concepts" to identify ways to improve current procedures and processes for future operations, he said. "This is a conceptual-type review of things we currently do and asking, 'Can we do them better?'

"So this is not only about building new things," Drake continued. "We are also improving the things we have, trying to make them better, more cost effective and easier for folks in the field."

For example, the team is researching better ways to operate in remote areas with little or no infrastructure to support those operations, Drake explained. Its members continue to explore smaller, more efficient power sources and new technologies that make it easier to communicate and push data.

"We have learned a lot over the past decade," he said. "The good news, from my seat, is that I have seen a lot of the processes, procedures and policies changing for the better. We are embracing technology earlier and more fully. And my belief is that if we were faced with a similar situation in the future, we would do it somewhat differently as a result."

But the search is far from over, and Drake said his team is leaving no stone unturned in its efforts to support U.S. forces in the region.

"We always have our eyes over the fence to see what is going on," he said. "As I tell my staff, 'We will go anywhere. We will listen to anything,' because I never know when the next, best technology is going to manifest itself."

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