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27 September 2006

http://usinfo.state.gov/xarchives/display.html?p=washfile-english&y=2006&m=September&x=20060926182525adynned0.6570703

26 September 2006

President To Declassify Intelligence Report on Iraq

Bush calls idea of reducing terrorism by leaving Iraq "preposterous"

Washington -- President Bush announced September 26 that he will release portions [below] of a classified intelligence report that he said the American news media mischaracterized as linking Iraqi security operations with an increased terrorist threat in the United States.

Speaking to the media September 26 alongside Afghan President Hamid Karzai, Bush said the classified National Intelligence Estimate completed in April, titled Trends in Global Terrorism: Implications for the United States, will be made available for public review.

Articles in major U.S. newspapers on September 24, citing anonymous sources, gave an impression that the report dealt principally with the relationship between Iraq and international terrorism, and stated that U.S. involvement in Iraq had made terrorism worse.

"Some people have guessed what is in the report and have concluded that going into Iraq was a mistake. I strongly disagree," Bush says.

"I think it's a mistake for people to believe that going on the offense against people that want to do harm to the American people makes us less safe," he said.

Terrorists are in Iraq and Afghanistan, he continued, because they seek to stop young democracies from developing. They use the struggles there as recruitment tools, he said, as Osama bin Laden previously used Somalia and the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.

"[T]o suggest that if we weren't in Iraq, we would see a rosier scenario with fewer extremists joining the radical movement requires us to ignore 20 years of experience," Bush said. The United States was not in Iraq when the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001, occurred, he said, nor when the World Trade Center in New York first was attacked in 1993; nor when U.S. embassies in Kenya and Tanzania were attacked in 1998, nor when the destroyer USS Cole was attacked in 2000.

"My judgment is: If we weren't in Iraq, they'd find some other excuse, because they have ambitions. They kill in order to achieve their objectives," he said.

The president reiterated his position that the U.S. government will do "whatever it takes" to protect its citizens, and that the best way to do that in the War on Terror is to defeat the terrorists overseas.

"We're not going to let their excuses stop us from staying on the offense," he said.

As for the National Intelligence Estimate, the president said he found it interesting that stories about the report, which was finished in April, did not appear in the press until now. "Somebody has taken it upon themselves to leak classified information for political purposes," he said, referring to possible attempts to influence the U.S. national elections on November 7.

Bush told reporters he has directed John Negroponte, the director of national intelligence, to declassify the document as soon as possible to stop speculation about its findings and any attempt “to confuse the American people about the nature of this enemy."

Negroponte also spoke about the intelligence report in remarks he made September 25 at the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars in Washington. He said the recent media stories "left the incorrect impression that this [report] dealt principally with the relationship between Iraq and international terrorism."

In reality, the director said, the report "provides a broad, strategic framework for understanding the trends that will define the primary international terrorist threats to United States interests over the coming five years."

The process the report describes started years ago and still continues, he added. The segment on Iraq represents only a small portion of the overall report, he said.

A transcript of Bush’s remarks is available on the White House Web site. The full text [below] of Negroponte’s prepared remarks is available on Web site of the Office of the Director of National Intelligence.

For more on U.S. responses to and policies about terrorism, see Response to Terrorism.

(Distributed by the Bureau of International Information Programs, U.S. Department of State. Web site: http://usinfo.state.go

http://www.dni.gov/press_releases/Declassified_NIE_Key_Judgments.pdf

Declassified Key Judgments of the National
Intelligence Estimate Trends in Global Terrorism:
Implications for the United States dated April 2006

Key Judgments

United States-led counterterrorism efforts have seriously damaged the leadership of al-Qa’ida and disrupted its operations; however, we judge that al-Qa’ida will continue to pose the greatest threat to the Homeland and US interests abroad by a single terrorist organization. We also assess that the global jihadist movement—which includes al-Qa’ida, affiliated and independent terrorist groups, and emerging networks and cells—is spreading and adapting to counterterrorism efforts.

• Although we cannot measure the extent of the spread with precision, a large body of all-source reporting indicates that activists identifying themselves as jihadists, although a small percentage of Muslims, are increasing in both number and geographic dispersion.

• If this trend continues, threats to US interests at home and abroad will become more diverse, leading to increasing attacks worldwide.

• Greater pluralism and more responsive political systems in Muslim majority nations would alleviate some of the grievances jihadists exploit. Over time, such progress, together with sustained, multifaceted programs targeting the vulnerabilities of the jihadist movement and continued pressure on al-Qa’ida, could erode support for the jihadists.

We assess that the global jihadist movement is decentralized, lacks a coherent global strategy, and is becoming more diffuse. New jihadist networks and cells, with anti-American agendas, are increasingly likely to emerge. The confluence of shared purpose and dispersed actors will make it harder to find and undermine jihadist groups.

• We assess that the operational threat from self-radicalized cells will grow in importance to US counterterrorism efforts, particularly abroad but also in the Homeland.

• The jihadists regard Europe as an important venue for attacking Western interests. Extremist networks inside the extensive Muslim diasporas in Europe facilitate recruitment and staging for urban attacks, as illustrated by the 2004 Madrid and 2005 London bombings.

We assess that the Iraq jihad is shaping a new generation of terrorist leaders and operatives; perceived jihadist success there would inspire more fighters to continue the struggle elsewhere.

• The Iraq conflict has become the "cause celebre" for jihadists, breeding a deep resentment of US involvement in the Muslim world and cultivating supporters for the global jihadist movement. Should jihadists leaving Iraq perceive themselves, and be perceived, to have failed, we judge fewer fighters will be inspired to carry on the fight.

We assess that the underlying factors fueling the spread of the movement outweigh its vulnerabilities and are likely to do so for the duration of the timeframe of this Estimate.

• Four underlying factors are fueling the spread of the jihadist movement: (1) Entrenched grievances, such as corruption, injustice, and fear of Western domination, leading to anger, humiliation, and a sense of powerlessness; (2) the Iraq "jihad;" (3) the slow pace of real and sustained economic, social, and political reforms in many Muslim majority nations; and (4) pervasive anti-US sentiment among most Muslims -- all of which jihadists exploit.

Concomitant vulnerabilities in the jihadist movement have emerged that, if fully exposed and exploited, could begin to slow the spread of the movement. They include dependence on the continuation of Muslim-related conflicts, the limited appeal of the jihadists. radical ideology, the emergence of respected voices of moderation, and criticism of the violent tactics employed against mostly Muslim citizens.

• The jihadists' greatest vulnerability is that their ultimate political solution -- an ultra-conservative interpretation of shari'a-based governance spanning the Muslim world.is unpopular with the vast majority of Muslims. Exposing the religious and political straitjacket that is implied by the jihadists' propaganda would help to divide them from the audiences they seek to persuade.

• Recent condemnations of violence and extremist religious interpretations by a few notable Muslim clerics signal a trend that could facilitate the growth of a constructive alternative to jihadist ideology: peaceful political activism. This also could lead to the consistent and dynamic participation of broader Muslim communities in rejecting violence, reducing the ability of radicals to capitalize on passive community support. In this way, the Muslim mainstream emerges as the most powerful weapon in the war on terror.

• Countering the spread of the jihadist movement will require coordinated multilateral efforts that go well beyond operations to capture or kill terrorist leaders.

If democratic reform efforts in Muslim majority nations progress over the next five years, political participation probably would drive a wedge between intransigent extremists and groups willing to use the political process to achieve their local objectives. Nonetheless, attendant reforms and potentially destabilizing transitions will create new opportunities for jihadists to exploit.

Al-Qa’ida, now merged with Abu Mus’ab al-Zarqawi’s network, is exploiting the situation in Iraq to attract new recruits and donors and to maintain its leadership role.

• The loss of key leaders, particularly Usama Bin Ladin, Ayman al-Zawahiri, and al-Zarqawi, in rapid succession, probably would cause the group to fracture into smaller groups. Although like-minded individuals would endeavor to carry on the mission, the loss of these key leaders would exacerbate strains and disagreements. We assess that the resulting splinter groups would, at least for a time, pose a less serious threat to US interests than does al-Qa'ida.

• Should al-Zarqawi continue to evade capture and scale back attacks against Muslims, we assess he could broaden his popular appeal and present a global threat.

• The increased role of Iraqis in managing the operations of al-Qa'ida in Iraq might lead veteran foreign jihadists to focus their efforts on external operations.

Other affiliated Sunni extremist organizations, such as Jemaah Islamiya, Ansar al-Sunnah, and several North African groups, unless countered, are likely to expand their reach and become more capable of multiple and/or mass-casualty attacks outside their traditional areas of operation.

We assess that such groups pose less of a danger to the Homeland than does al-Qa'ida but will pose varying degrees of threat to our allies and to US interests abroad. The focus of their attacks is likely to ebb and flow between local regime targets and regional or global ones.

We judge that most jihadist groups -- both well-known and newly formed -- will use improvised explosive devices and suicide attacks focused primarily on soft targets to implement their asymmetric warfare strategy, and that they will attempt to conduct sustained terrorist attacks in urban environments. Fighters with experience in Iraq are a potential source of leadership for jihadists pursuing these tactics.

• CBRN capabilities will continue to be sought by jihadist groups.

While Iran, and to a lesser extent Syria, remain the most active state sponsors of terrorism, many other states will be unable to prevent territory or resources from being exploited by terrorists.

Anti-US and anti-globalization sentiment is on the rise and fueling other radical ideologies. This could prompt some leftist, nationalist, or separatist groups to adopt terrorist methods to attack US interests. The radicalization process is occurring more quickly, more widely, and more anonymously in the Internet age, raising the likelihood of surprise attacks by unknown groups whose members and supporters may be difficult to pinpoint.

• We judge that groups of all stripes will increasingly use the Internet to communicate, propagandize, recruit, train, and obtain logistical and financial support.

http://www.dni.gov/speeches/20060925_speech.pdf

Remarks by the Director of National Intelligence
Ambassador John D. Negroponte

Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars

Washington, DC

September 25, 2006

_______________________________________________________________

AS PREPARED FOR DELIVERY

Thank you for that very kind introduction, Lee. I'm delighted to be here at the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars this evening and pleased to see many good friends in attendance.

Tonight I would like to focus on a public policy concern that I think is relevant to Wilson Center.s broad agenda and narrow it down a bit as I go to address some of my particular policy concerns as Director of National Intelligence.

The issue is America.s competitiveness in the fields of science and technology, which was assessed from an economic perspective earlier this year in an excellent report by the National Academies of Sciences and Engineering and the Institute of Medicine.

That report, called Rising Above the Gathering Storm, described a world that is being transformed from a scientific and technological perspective at a breath-taking rate of change -- and it offered a number of alarming statistics about how America is responding to that change.

I'll cite a few of those statistics:

• Some 34% of doctoral degrees in natural sciences and 56% of engineering PhDs in the United States are awarded to foreign-born students.

• In South Korea, 38% of all undergraduates receive their degrees in natural science or engineering. In France, the figure is 47%, in China, 50%, and in Singapore, 67%. The corresponding figure in the United States is 15%.

These statistics should give us pause when we consider the fact that we are living in the midst of a sustained technical revolution.

• Humankind's knowledge base -- in simple terms, what we know -- has increased exponentially in the last 15 years and access to this new information is expanding considerably.

• The National Security Agency estimates that, by next year, the Internet will carry 647 petabytes of data each day. That's 647 followed by 15 zeros. By way of comparison, the holdings of the Library of Congress represent only 0.02 petabytes.

• This year there are two billion cell phones in use worldwide. By 2009, there will be three billion.

Advances in technology, then, are accelerating, and thanks to globalization, they are spreading. The United States no longer corners the market on technology in general and in fact lags in some very significant segments of the market. State-of-the-art commercial technology is available globally and at very favorable prices. In 1990 we had a positive trade balance for high-tech products in the vicinity of $30 billion. In 2003, we had a negative trade balance for high-tech products in the vicinity of $30 billion.

The primary focus of the National Academies' report was on economic competitiveness. My concerns, in implementing intelligence reform, center on national security, which of course includes, but is by no means limited to, US economic competitiveness. Let me give you just a few examples of the challenges we face.

It is well known that young jihadists in Internet cafes, armed with laptops and DVD players, are constantly aiming to further extremist ideology and are attempting to replicate training via the Internet.

Islamic extremist fighters utilize improvised explosive devices and other weaponry, and their methods are becoming increasingly lethal due to technological advances. They are unleashing destruction in Iraq, Afghanistan, and most recently in Lebanon.

In other words, we are confronting adversaries who are achieving exponential improvements in their operations through widely available, cutting-edge technology in which their R&D costs are any CEO's dream: zero.

I could go on in this vein for some time, but I think the point is made that we've got a competitive challenge that will negatively impact our national security unless we take steps to deal with it right away.

The Intelligence Reform and Terrorism Prevention Act of 2004 understood this challenge. It created the position of Director of Science and Technology within my office and established the Director of National Intelligence Science and Technology Committee, comprising the principal science officers from various elements of the Intelligence Community.

These senior scientists have reviewed our S&T performance and identified three categories of "gaps" that we must address: mission gaps, capability gaps, and underlying process gaps. I'd like to talk to you a bit about each of these gaps, and then share with you our efforts to close them.

To cite a few mission gaps, we need to be able to do a better job:

• Locating terrorists;

• Identifying and locating WMD activities by nation states and non-state actors; and

• Protecting the homeland against WMD and cyber attacks.

With regard to capability gaps, we need to address some significant deficiencies. Among these:

• Our collection capabilities are not pervasive and persistent enough. Human intelligence enabling technology is far from where it needs to be.

• Intelligence analysis suffers from a lack of collaborative infrastructure and tools to help minimize analyst information overload; and

• Our ability to foster prudent information sharing remains inhibited by rigid, segregated networks that are too vulnerable to compromise.

Why are we experiencing these and other "gaps"? In part it's because our investment pattern is weighted very heavily toward big ticket, multiple year programs that yield incremental improvements against current priorities. We are becoming less agile than our targets at exploiting technology.and spending more time and money doing it.

Within the Intelligence Community and in discussions with our oversight committees on Capitol Hill, we are taking major steps to close our mission and capability gaps through process improvements and a very close study of how we can best make use of our resources. Our primary mission in the Office of the Director of National Intelligence is to ensure the full integration of the foreign, military, and domestic dimensions of intelligence into a unified enterprise. Our approach to S&T must be consistent with the integration of the Intelligence Community as a whole.

To foment creative, cost-effective basic research into critical intelligence challenges, we have proposed creating a parallel to the highly successful Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA). I would note that the National Academies made a similar proposal vis-à-vis the nation's energy needs, but again, our initiative would focus exclusively on intelligence questions. The Intelligence Advanced Research Projects Activity (IARPA) would conduct S&T research that:

• Cuts across multiple IC agencies;

• Targets new opportunities that lie in the white spaces between agencies;

• Provides innovations that agencies avoid because of current business models; and

• Generates revolutionary capabilities that will surprise our adversaries and help us avoid being surprised.

To foster the indispensable element of speed in moving research into practice, we have initiated the Rapid Technology Transition Initiative (RTTI). Our objective here is twofold:

• Assist the S&T components of the sixteen Agencies and elements of the IC to rapidly get their best-of-breed technologies into the hands of users; and

• Reinvent and reinvigorate S&T across the IC, within the strategic framework of Speed, Synergy, and Surprise.

To ensure maximum return on the overall S&T investment within the IC, we have developed a unified IC S&T Investment Plan. This fulfills an important provision of the Intelligence Reform statute and already has generated valuable new insights on three key issues:

• Collecting all that we need, everywhere, all the time;

• Coping with analyst information overload; and

• Effectively sharing and protecting intelligence.

For example we are making some transformative breakthroughs in S&T analysis, particularly within the processing of voluminous data.

• Computer-assisted linking of data on foreign terrorists is helping us disrupt plans for attacks in this country.

• Pattern analysis is helping us find the insurgents who are building IEDs in Iraq.

• Computer modeling is helping us uncover foreign activities that have been hidden underground to defeat US satellite imagery.

I can tell you that information technology is allowing our collectors and analysts to work more closely as a team. Today's technologies allow for far-flung collectors to combine the strengths of many different sensors and platforms, bringing perishable information home in time to protect the nation.

Last but not least, I would return to some of the data I cited with regard to the S&T human resources other nations are developing more quickly than we are. Science and technology-- basic research and practical applications of that research -- clearly are a function of human capital. That's as true in the field of intelligence as it is in business. Good scientists do good research.

We therefore have instituted numerous programs to attract, retain, and motivate scientists and technologists of the first rank. Through our Fellows program, for example, we provide leading IC researchers with untied funds to develop and pursue projects of their choosing. In our Ambassadors program, we enhance synergy across the Intelligence Community and the social networks of key technologists by assigning them for one year to other agencies.

By means of other rotational assignments and our new joint duty requirement for promotion to the senior ranks of the Intelligence Community, we are promoting an "expeditionary" mentality that brings researchers into contact with field and operational challenges. There have been many pay-offs already. If we are more effective in dealing with a major challenge such as locating high-value terrorists, it is at least partly due to the innovations of some of our most senior and most creative scientists.

So, yes, we do face a daunting set of challenges in today's world, and they are different challenges from those of the last century -- not only because our adversaries are different in kind and character, but also because their weapons and technical resources are different in kind and character. There are ways in which we can maintain and extend important advantages, however, if we act with a sense of urgency and if we embrace the imperatives and inevitability of change. From the perspective of dealing with international terrorists, proliferators of weapons of mass destruction, and unfriendly states that are masters of denial and deception, revolutionary advances in science and technology are essential.

As I noted earlier, we need to ensure that when it comes to S&T, speed, surprise, and synergy are on our side. This has to be a priority for us as we implement our comprehensive program of intelligence reform, and it is.

Before I close, I want also to talk about an entirely different subject. Last Sunday.s newspapers carried stories about a classified National Intelligence Estimate (NIE) completed last April, entitled Trends in Global Terrorism: Implications for the United States. These stories left the incorrect impression that this NIE dealt principally with the relationship between Iraq and international terrorism.

In fact, the Estimate provides a broad, strategic framework for understanding the trends that will define the primary international terrorist threats to United States interests over the coming five years. It attempts to describe a process that started years ago and is continuing. The discussion of Iraq represents a small portion of the overall NIE.

To provide some context let me elaborate on how I have generally characterized our assessments on previous occasions, often before Congress, and in ways consistent with April's NIE:

• United States-led counterterrorism efforts have seriously damaged the leadership of al-Qa'ida and disrupted its operations; however, we judge that al-Qa'ida will continue to pose the most significant threat to the Homeland and US interests abroad by any single terrorist group.

• The global jihadist movement -- which includes al-Qa'ida, affiliated and independent terrorist groups, and emerging networks and cells -- is spreading and adapting to counterterrorism efforts. Several underlying factors are fueling this, including entrenched grievances such as corruption, injustice, and fear of western domination, leading to anger, humiliation, and a sense of powerlessness; the Iraq jihad; the slow pace of real and sustained economic, social, and political reforms in many Muslim majority nations; and pervasive anti-US sentiment among most Muslims.all of which jihadists exploit.

• The global jihadist movement is becoming more diffuse and that the threat from self-radicalized cells will grow in importance to US counterterrorism efforts.

• The Iraq jihad is shaping a new generation of terrorist leaders and operatives. However, should jihadists leaving Iraq perceive themselves, and be perceived, to have failed, fewer fighters will be inspired to carry on the fight.

• Vulnerabilities in the jihadist movement have emerged that could begin to slow the spread of the movement. They include the limited appeal of the jihadists' radical ideology, the emergence of respected voices of moderation, and criticism of the violent tactics employed against mostly Muslim citizens. Countering the spread of the jihadist movement will require coordinated multilateral efforts that go well beyond operations to capture or kill terrorist leaders.

• Greater pluralism and more responsive political systems in Muslim majority nations would alleviate some of the grievances jihadists exploit. Over time, such progress, together with sustained, multifaceted programs targeting the vulnerabilities of the jihadist movement and continued pressure on al-Qa'ida, could erode support for the jihadists. As you can see, this is a very broad summary of trends in global terrorism. But that is the point. An NIE provides a comprehensive assessment of major issues facing the United States, providing the best intelligence we can develop for policy-makers.

Thank you very much.