A very good afternoon to everyone and welcome to a historic panel. This is historic because to the best of our knowledge, a dedicated panel on the future of militaries has never ever taken place in the World Economic Forum. So you're pressing that creation first but not the last. You will have seen from the program that we put much more emphasis this year on geopolitics, international security, and the phenomenon of geo-economics, which is the intersection between global political change and global economic change. That's no coincidence because we have just lived through a year that many has described as a geopolitical annual horribilis. We have seen both an exacerbation of problems related to asymmetric threats like the growth of the Islamic State in the Middle East. But we also see in the return of strategic competition between key players, for instance over the conflict in Ukraine. Just remind the audience that exactly a year ago when we were ending Davos, there were political troubles in Ukraine but no fighting. So all of that has happened over the last year and likewise in many parts of the world we're seeing a world that is more conflictual than it has been in a long time. So that's a major theme in many panels and I see many people who have attended other panels in the same vein. You know, this panel is on the future of militaries. So it's on the implication of these broader geopolitical security trends on the military profession and on military choices and on military leadership and on the leadership of those entrusted with overseeing how militaries are run, prepared, trained, how investments are made. And that's the part of it which is innovative to the World Economic Forum. But so far the impression has been that this is an area in which there's a lot of interest in many of our communities because these things intersect with each other in completely new ways. We have a remarkable panel here this afternoon. We have people with live experience from conflicts, some of them ongoing in their own country. To start with the Deputy Prime Minister of Iraq, Mr. Rosh Shavaz, who has a distinguished political career in Iraq, but who has also been commander of the Peshmerga. And the Peshmerga are among those around the front line in the battle against IS on the ground. Others are in the air. They are on the ground in the battle against the Islamic State. We have Minister Pinsan Bueno, Juan Carlos Pinsan Bueno, who is Minister of National Defense of Colombia, another country who hopefully is on its way out of an internal military conflict that has been going on for, I guess, long before you were born. Not only because you were a young man, but also because the conflict has been going on for a long time. We look very much forward to hear your perspectives. Professor Joe Nye, renowned thinker on hard security, soft security, no sort of hard power, soft power and smart power, but also somebody with a background from military leadership as he has been Assistant Secretary of Defense in the U.S. during the Clinton administration. Ambassador Wolfgang Ischinger, who again, a long-distinguished career in German diplomacy, no head of the Munich Security Conference, which is upcoming in a couple of weeks, and Vice Admiral Kurt Tidd, who is Assistant to the Chairman of Joint Chief of Staff and represents the American military, has also been here with Secretary Kerry, and we very much appreciate that you were able to stay on and be with us in this panel. So that's the cost. And I would like to start, maybe, with the Deputy Prime Minister, also because you are, as we said, that battlefront. What lessons for the future of the militaries and the present, of course, in your case, are you drawing from what's going on right now in the battle of IS that the rest of us would like to learn something about? Well, first of all, I have to speak frankly about the situation in Iraq. We are facing many challenges. The most important challenges are tackling the terrorism, the fight which is going on in Iraq. The humanitarian problems which we had, we had to deal with a huge number of refugees, almost two million people inside Iraq. Some of them are from Syrian, other are internal people from the areas of Mosul, Tikrit, Amba, Samara, the Sunni regions, especially, and beside the other challenges, which are mainly the heritage of the previous dictator regime of Saddam Hussein. And beside all of that, the main problem in Iraq now is the oil prices. Because of the oil prices, the budget of the Iraqi budget is lower to mostly about 60%. Now we have to deal with 40% of the revenues which were awaited for this year. So this means in general that Iraq to tackle the terrorism very effectively needs economic help. This is one of the main realities in Iraq. Secondly, the Iraqi security forces, especially after the collapse in June 2014 in Mosul, the Iraqi army and the police forces, all they need to be reorganized from the beginning, oriented and equipped. The main duty is to be successful, to gain victory against the terrorists. I don't want to call them the Islamic State because they are not Islamic State, they are terrorists in general. But the militias who are working and supporting the Iraqi government in this moment, they have also to be controlled through the governmental institutions and put in line with the benefit of the country in the direction of helping to achieve reconciliation and mutual understanding among the component of the Iraqi community. Beside all of that, the Iraqi security institution, they have to cooperate much better with the Peshmerga forces who are fighting in the north and at the same time, they have to coordinate with the alliance, with the coalition forces and take benefit from the opportunity that there are a lot of people who are trying to help them and train them. In Kurdistan, the Peshmerga are fighting very severely, but they are effective. It is not an exaggeration if I say the only force who have gained some victory against Daesh people, against the terrorists and has broken their magic that they are undefeatable. And the Peshmerga has approved that. The Peshmerga now is very close to Mosul, but alone they cannot enter Mosul because of many reasons. First of all, Mosul is an urban center. It has to be studied very carefully how to deal with the problem of such a large city, how to deal with the such a population center. And at the same time, Mosul is a center of the Sunni Arab people. And this might, when the Peshmerga alone tries to attack Mosul or try to free Mosul then alone without the cooperation of the Arab Sunnis and without the cooperation of the Iraqi armies, this is almost impossible. Besides all of that, the Peshmerga, they are still not very equipped. They have some help. These are some weapons, some ammunition. But if you really want to tackle the terrorism, you need a real army in the region. And the Peshmerga, they are a reliable force. If the international community and Iraqi government itself tries to organize the Peshmerga as a real symmetric military force, then they can be a force which can tackle the terrorism in Iraq, even in Syria, and for a long period of time. Thank you very much. Thank you very much for bringing us up to date to some very harsh military realities in your region. Let's go to Minister Pilsson Bueno. We talked a little bit yesterday, and we talked about the challenges related to dealing with a present conflict, while at the same time planning for the near and the more long-term future. Share some of those thoughts with us, please. Well, first I would like to comment that if you look at the context of Colombia, 15 years ago, for many experts the country was almost called a failed state. And I think the most important institutions that really helped contribute to turn around the country was precisely the armed forces. Our armed forces were built up in a way that we were able to start protecting the people, recovering territorial control, fighting crime, the sources of violence like drug trafficking, kidnapping and other kinds of crime. And with a very strong cooperation, but I would say at the same time, very low-cost cooperation from the U.S. as compared to what they have done in other parts. But it really created the possibility to create the environment in which we are right now. When we did all that build up, what we wanted was at the end to bring peace to the Colombian people. What we have now is a process in which the consequence of our military and police successes and the degrading of terrorist organizations have allowed President Santos to lead the idea of a peace process. And that is credible, that hopefully is visible, and in which we're moving forward. That puts me on this discussion, on the future of the military and in our case our police, because in the Colombian case it's in the same shop of the Ministry of Defense. So we have been planning in three different avenues that somehow have been, you know, being planned in parallel, but they are overlapping already because of the way events are happening. So the first line of thought was how do we plan for the present? How do we push enough first the terrorist groups and their sources of funding to put them in a position that they cannot have a different alternative than going into a negotiating process? That's where we are. We haven't finished. So we need to keep the pace, we need to keep the success and we need to keep specially giving confidence to the people and to investors that have come to the country, that have turned around the economy, that have created jobs in order to really move forward. So that's our first effort. Second, most of the Colombian people is asking these days not anymore for protection against war, which is now happening just in 9% of the total territory as compared to 50% 15 years ago. But people is asking now for the same things people will ask in any city of the world, street crime protection. I mean they want to feel secure. So we have been able in this initiative of the present to launch a street crime or what we call citizen security policy in order to strengthen the national police, strengthen security tools, technology cameras and other capabilities, even the attorney general office to really offer the people now this new level of security that they are asking. Then we have a second line of planning. So it's what we call transition. The question is if we sign a peace agreement and we keep pushing for that and that's the national strategy as we speak, what is important is that the day after we really have a plan that guarantees a very orderly process of demobilization, disarmament, reintegration and at the same time tackling other issues like even the security of those who are demobilizing and other types of efforts related. We create a joint command led by a force general that is dedicated with an interagency and as I said join effort with the other services to plan on this and to be part even of the ending phase of the negotiation as long as we're able to get there. So I think that's another important signal. And finally we have a third line of planning. She's thinking for the future. How are we going to shape the armed forces for what comes next? So first of all, we have to look at this on two visions. One, our internal issues and second, how can we contribute to peace and stability in a region and in the world as a major interest? So when we think internally, the first challenge we will have is to tackle those crimes that will still continue beyond the peace process. I mean drug trafficking, criminal mining, extortion will just not vanish. It might continue there. So we will have to guarantee that we have the national police and the armed forces that can tackle that depending on the region, depending on how we do things. Second, there is a major issue for a country like Colombia. Colombia and in general terms Latin America, particularly ending countries Brazil, we are very well endowed with natural resources, with sorts of water and with biodiversity in general terms. Those three things might appear one of the things that are more valuable if you think 50 years from now, starting even now. So we have to plan our armed forces to become more environmental friendly, if I can put it that way, and to really be close to this national endowment that is very important for our future and certainly for the future of our people. Then strengthening national police, that is critical. That's what we see for the future. If we were able to get here, the only thing we cannot do is weaken the armed forces, weaken the national police on the country, is strengthening these capabilities, considering budgetary constraints, but it's strengthening these capabilities what will offer that sustainability of peace. Certainly border control. I mean we have been for a long time not providing that kind of border control and that has a lot for smuggling weapons, drug trafficking and other situations, so we have to look how to do that. And finally is our international approach. What we see in our case is that we never wanted the experience we have, but we now have it. And suddenly when we come to these international discussions, it appears that one of the most important challenges everybody is facing is what you might call a rural warfare or asymmetric threats. Well, that's what we learned to do somehow. So that experience is already being offered to the world by different ways. First we have been training in the past five years 18,000 police and military out of 63 nations. Most of them certainly from our region, Central America, the Caribbean and other parts. So that's a way to contribute to stability. And on the other side we have been signing agreements with the European Union. Next week we will sign an agreement with United Nations for peace missions and that kind of cooperation. My impression, our impression after this study, because this is a consequence of a large analysis we're involved in, is that in the coming future, even today, no nation, and I would say even the U.S. can tackle problems alone. So cooperation is the issue, it's the way of doing things. And certainly peace and stability in the world is a matter of importance for a country like Colombia, certainly for its own internal peace, certainly for what is required, I think among nations. Thank you very much, Minister. Let's move to Professor Nye, whom I also mentioned had been key policymaker, assistant secretary of the fence in the biggest armed forces in the world. But still an armed force that has to make choices because being big doesn't mean that you don't have to make some serious choices. If you were asked by the President right now to say what are the main issues for the U.S. military or the future, where would you start? Well, I think the hardest thing for a large country military like the U.S. is for the military to ask, what kind of war are we planning for? And you know, we go in cycles of conventional beliefs of what the next war, there may never be another Iraq, there will never be another Vietnam, so on and so forth. The answer is we don't know, and we're often wrong when we make these predictions. Twenty years ago, I think it was a British general who said we're now fighting fourth generation warfare. He was commanding in Bosnia. He said it's war among the peoples. It's not large military units confronting each other. It's war among the people. When you might say we're really in a fifth generation warfare, it's almost war without people. Drones, cyber, you know, where are the people? Not near the battlefront. They're all the receiving end of the drones. Well, then the receiving end, and somebody has to push the button, but it's a very different concept than Napoleon getting his phalanxes in the right positions. We talk now about hybrid warfare, which is, if you look at Gaza in 2006 or Ukraine today, it's really a mixture of covert military units with political units struggling to control the message. So you're mixing your propaganda with your fighting in ways in which you're trying to accomplish what your real objective is, is a political objective, and how you mix the battling with the propaganda. So the short answer then is if you ask if the President says, I have to cut my defense budget or I want to save money, what do I do? Don't make the mistake we made after Vietnam where we deliberately unlearned the lessons of counterinsurgency. I'm not in favor of coined, but I'm just saying to think that you will never need it again would be a grave mistake. You do have to basically have a wide portfolio of capabilities and particularly if you can't predict what kind of war you're going to be in and you may be involved in many, you're going to have to build a portfolio which allows you to deal with a lot of contingencies which you hope you won't have to deal with. And in that sense, I think I've just written a book called Is the American Century Over It? And I think my answer is no, and I think American military power will be preeminent for quite some time, but it only will be preeminent if you learn how to use it without other instruments and don't make the mistake of thinking you know what the shape of future war is. So a good military planner has to have a very broad horizon. Thank you very much Professor Nile. Let's go to Ambassador Ishinger. Two weeks you'll have the Munich Security Conference and you've had that now for 50 plus years. I think not you personally, but the conference has been there. Which means of course the main issues of the day are always debated. Can you help us with extracting some of the mega trends when it comes to how conflict is involving and how the battlefield is changing? Well Espen, you made the most important point at the beginning and I think Professor Nile just underlined that also. The difficulty is to predict what's going to happen next. A year ago today as you were conducting this conference and as we were in the last stages of preparing Munich, not one person, and I was talking to many here in this room, not one person in mid-January of last year told me that I should stage the debate about Ukraine as a debate about the failure, the breakdown of European security. Everybody said let's have some of these actors from Ukraine, you know, Klitschko and hopefully some of the rebels. This is a debate, this is a conflict in Ukraine. This was a year ago. Now it is a European conflict, maybe even a global challenge. And the same of course is true with the so-called Islamic State etc. In other words, we have no choice. Professor Nile just made the point, our militaries have to be prepared for all sorts of contingencies. We can not only prepare for territorial defense for a while, some of us in Europe thought that was over completely. Now we are rediscovering that the core task of NATO should still be an important part of our agenda. But again, not the only one. We also need to prepare for the kinds of modern variants like hybrid warfare, insurgency situations etc. Now, if it is true that most of the conflicts that we will be looking at will tend to be more conflicts within countries than classic conflicts between state A and state B trying to send tank armies against each other, then it is going to be generally more difficult than in the past to end a conflict. World War II in Europe was ended by the Nazis surrendering and the Allies occupying. And that was that. That definitely ended that war. Ending a war like the one you are engaged in, I believe is much harder because you are not likely to have some kind of official surrender. So the question of how you can create a sustainable, lasting political solution in these difficult circumstances is I think the big challenge. What does that require? It requires that our militaries need to be trained highly intelligently. They need to understand the environment. They need to be engaged in either themselves or with other parts of our institutions in civil elements, reconstruction, nation building. I don't want to be too long here, but in Europe we believe and we continue to believe in deterrence as a major instrument of preventing conflict. When I look at some of these conflicts in the Middle East and elsewhere, maybe preventive nation building to prevent countries from becoming failed states, to prevent countries from being so weak that they cannot deal with insurgent groups is also important. In other words, these non-military aspects of post-conflict rehabilitation, nation building and pre-conflict preventive financial, political, social and other methods of soft intervention are also very important. Let me make one final point. In Europe, for the 28 members of the European Union, the future of the military will not work, will not produce meaningful results unless we are willing to make concessions on the principle of sovereignty. We need to accept the fact that if we keep lowering our defense budgets, the only way to have capable fighting forces is if we pool and share. Effectively pooling and sharing means that you're going to have to rely on your ally that he will be with you. In other words, that you have joint decision making, and that's a hard thing to do. So for the 28 members of the European Union, pooling and sharing and discussing the question how we can move into a more joint decision-making apparatus, respecting our parliamentary caveats and prerogatives, that's really a huge political task for coming years. Thank you, Wolfgang. I think the message from the panel so far to you representing the soldiers and sailors is that we want you to be best at everything at the same time. Back in the Cold War, we were happy as long as you were deterring Third World War. That was kind of easy and it worked.  And now I think you have to do a little bit of both. How does that look from your perspective? I think I would contest the argument. I think we have always been expected to deal with whatever card was put on the table at any time in history. And as has already been pointed out, our ability to predict what may be coming with a high degree of accuracy is almost 100% imperfect. So we do need to be able to prepare forces that are able to deal with a wide range. The types of adversaries, I think we're all in agreement, expand the range of nation-states engaged in conventional nation-on-nation combat operations. It could be nation-states engaged in hybrid or proxy warfare, employing either direct proxies or sometimes employing the services of transnational organized criminal networks. And we also have to deal with the phenomena of heavily ideologically motivated terrorist networks. And so in order to deal with that wide range of contingencies, modern militaries will have to retain the ability to engage in high-end nation-state war-on-war, state-on-state warfare. For two reasons, principally, one, if you retain that capability, that serves as a strong deterrent of nations perhaps miscalculating or engaging in dangerous activities that could lead to that kind of a conflict. Secondly, if you purport to be an exporter of security, an exporter of the ability to train and equip other countries, you have to show that you are proficient in that type of warfare. So we place a high priority on, regardless of the degree of technology that it's employed and regardless of the advanced futuristic types of concepts, the small unit infantry tactics, the dirty, bloody, difficult end of the business, you have to prove that you can master or you won't be effective. But I think as we look to the future and particularly as we look to the development of military leaders, we have discovered that we must make sure that we develop the kind of leaders that have the intellectual agility and certainly the flexibility of doctrine and of procedures to be able to work not just with other military services. That was the big argument 30 years ago. But to be able to work very, very effectively with the full spectrum of the national security enterprise. So that means military forces being able to communicate effectively and understand and work with law enforcement organizations, intelligence organizations, professional diplomats, as well as in many instances, non-governmental organizations that we find all around the world. So it is a difficult challenge but we have found over the last 10 years that we have been able to blend those kinds of capabilities into very effective networks that we can lay down on top of these adversary networks, that we can work very, very closely with international partners who also have developed a high degree of expertise, as is the case with Columbia, that we are able to in some instances and in some countries help them as they try to develop the synapses between their interagency organizations to try and build the trust between law enforcement and intelligence community and the military. So that's where we're going. That's the direction that we need to go because this has already been pointed out. With today's global security challenges, there is no single country in the world that is able to deal with these challenges individually in isolation. We all have recognized this a long time ago and placed great importance on the ability to work effectively with partners. Which was also a major theme in the State of the Union address from President Obama. Are you actively trying to learn the lessons from, for instance, Columbia or the Peshmerman? I would say we have been learning the lessons and we've been working very closely with Columbia and we share a rich history of working together. And I would say in today's era we are learning as much or more from Columbia as perhaps we might have taught in the past. So they are an excellent exporter of security both within the region and as Minister Pinzon has pointed out, into West Africa and other places. So it's a good partnership. One of the thorny questions that the defense ministers in I think every country in the world struggles with, I've tried that myself in my own tenure, is how do you make the long term investment decisions given that the world changes as much as we just heard in one year? Because if you particularly if you're a smaller country, but even for the US, you will have it, sometimes you have to make a choice. Do you want to invest in a new frigate or a submarine? Or do you want more light special forces?  But if you have to make a choice, how do you know? Because the lead time is many years to take many, many years to build this equipment and take years to train people to do it, to run it. And then you will have it for 40 years until you have to decide whether you want to do it again or not. How do you make these decisions in such a volatile world? Open question. One of the vice... A former vice chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff once said, platforms aren't what you focus on. Your platforms will be around, but what's on the platforms, the information systems, those are going to change very rapidly. So invest in platforms which you can adapt and adapt quickly. So, you know, the B-52 has been around longer than Davos. But the B-52 today is not the B-52 of the 1960s. The same thing as you think of aircraft. It was an innovator just like Davos. Yeah, right, exactly it was. It's the continual change, but the continual application of information technology systems. So don't focus too much on the platform. Focus instead on the ability to keep adapting the platform. Should we open the floor for a quick question? It must be a quick question. We have very few minutes. But before I do that, just as a teaser, the next panel in this very room, just after this, is on the future of intelligence services. And I think there's some overlap in interest. You may want to stay so you can come back to this in the next panel. But for the military, the first question is here. Thank you. I'm Farid Yasin. I'm the Iraqi ambassador to France, which puts me in an interesting point of perspective. There is much more to the military than fighting. The military as an institution is in many countries a force for social cohesion. And that's a point that's being raised by many countries, including my own, and including France, where I currently reside. Because we've seen lots of people take a tangent and go off and become deadly insurgents elsewhere. And there is debate now in France, as there is in Iraq about reintroducing conscription as a measure of social cohesion, to ensure social cohesion. And I note that we're in Switzerland, which is the country par excellence of the citizens army and it's exemplary in its social cohesion. So my question to the panel is, what role do you see for the future military in terms of implementing, ensuring social cohesion in countries? And what do you think conscription play a role in an ever increasingly specialized forces? Thank you. Great question. Please collect a few so the audience has a chance and Nari Woods will have the floor in a second. But I just want to recognize the presence of the Chief of Defence of Switzerland and thank him for his troops actually making it possible for us to be here. And the people who are protecting the outer perimeter are actually largely conscripts. So that's part of the answer to your question, I guess. Over here. Hello, I'm Amanda Ellis, the New Zealand Ambassador to the UN in Geneva. You mentioned the importance of working with a range of actors, including international diplomats. For those of us who are now on the Security Council, tell us what we can be doing to support you helping create a safer world. Okay, one more question. I can't see it. Yeah, right there. Gideon Rose. Gideon Rose, Editor of Foreign Affairs. In the last year we've seen Russia invade Crimea, the ongoing conflict in Ukraine and Western sanctions applied in response. Taken as a whole, has this experience undermined norms about the use of force and aggression or reinforced them? Great question. Thank you, Gideon. Okay, I'll have one more if there's somebody. General, no? Okay, let's go back to the panel. Yeah, there was one. You're there. Right there. Thank you. Noah Barkin at Reuters based in Berlin. I have a question for Mr. Ischinger. A year ago at the Munich Security Conference we had heard speeches from the German President, the German Defense Minister, the German Foreign Minister, calling for a more active German farm policy, a more muscular farm policy. Where are we a year later after Ukraine, the arming of the Kurds in Iraq? Okay, great. Thank you for those questions. Yeah, why don't we start with this? Okay, thank you. Thanks for the question. Well, there's good news and there's bad news. The bad news is that we have just released, actually, yesterday the results of a poll taken in Germany of, to what extent, Germans would support a more proactive, including more militarily proactive, foreign policy. The result does not lead to great euphoria. In other words, Germans apparently remain rather skeptical. At the same time, that's the good news, I think the debate in Munich last year started not only a broad discussion in Germany, it led to certain decisions and to certain policies, which without the start of this debate would not have happened. One is the delivery of certain types of weapons to the Peshmerga. Totally impossible to imagine a year ago. Second, the kind of, and I put it in quotes, in quotation marks, the kind of leadership role which Chancellor Merkel and our Foreign Minister have had to assume more or less in terms of how to deal with our Russian counterparts on the Ukrainian crisis. I think that is something which has been encouraged by this debate. So in other words, I think things have changed. Some of you may feel they haven't changed enough, but I think things are changing in the right direction. Great questions on social cohesion, as created by the military. You talked about the role of the military in taking a nation ahead, not only security, I think was what you mentioned, and the issue of conscript, who want to go in? I think we recognize historically there have been very, very important roles played by militaries in the role of social cohesion. The challenge that you will always run into is there is going to be a tension. Among the professional military, I suspect they will always prefer to have a professional military that can be highly trained, that has a degree of commitment to the mission that perhaps may be greater, and perhaps national leaders may find it easier to use professional militaries, because there won't be constrictions placed on where those military forces can be deployed to or how they may be employed. So there's going to be more flexibility. But that's not to say that there's not an important role to be played, and I think we all recognize that the more members of certainly a democracy understand exactly what is at stake, exactly what the price to be paid for enjoying the types of freedoms and liberties that we enjoy, the stronger the democracy will be. So it's a tension. We have exactly three more minutes and three more speakers to come with their final comment.  If there had been no response to the taking of a neighbor's territory by force, which profoundly violates the 1945 settlement, then I think the norm would have been damaged. The fact that we've had sanctions, the fact that they're having an effect, I mean oil price makes some important difference, but even before that, Putin was being cut off from the sources of Western technology he needs for frontier oil and gas. Instead, he's becoming China's gas station, which is not where he wants to be. He's destroyed the prospects for his Eurasian Union, and he's done something which we couldn't do if we tried, which is solidified NATO as we saw at Wales. So if you ask, is this man a brilliant strategist? No, he's a disastrous strategist. He's a brilliant tactician, but his tactics have included, unsuspectingly, reinforcement of the 1945 norm rather than destruction of it. And just a very quick 10 seconds on the UN Security Council. Never underestimate the importance of the United Nations peacekeeping forces. They're not perfect. They have all sorts of problems, but when the world gets into a mess in some area and can't figure it out, the presence of UN peacekeepers is extraordinarily important. Thank you very much for that. Before I get the floor to Pins on One, I just want to point out that in your answer, which I think is a good answer to that question, you also suggest one of the reasons why we're interested in geoeconomics, because actually the response to a military attack if in all practical purposes has been in the economic realm, which of course matters to the members because it means the return of the active use of economic instruments for strategic political means. And then we can reflect on that in future panels. Pins on One. There's some final observations on things that we have been doing in the present that I believe are important for the future listening to the discussion and to the questions. First, giving capabilities other than military to the armed forces is very important. Capabilities to giving building capacity or supporting natural disasters. I think that gives credibility, legitimacy, and at the same time certainly there are platform, a logistical platform that anyone else can match, at least in a country like mine and I believe in many countries. Second, education, military education. I think that is critical. The kind of problems the world is going to confront as Professor Nye very well described are unexpected. You never know. But the only way you can tackle those is if you have a cadre of professionals, in this case military professionals that are educated beyond their own technical or military responsibilities. So in our case right now I have more military than ever sewing in different universities in the world around 60, 65 officers and we're trying to increase that. That's a little bit of an effort that I believe is going to be important for the future. Third, understanding that we have to merge the capabilities of the military and the police and that's critical. At least on asymmetric challenges. When you go and try to confront the problem with a military, suddenly they will find that they are fighting crime or at least sources of violence that are related to crime. So we need a military that can be effective on policing but or a police that can have some kind of military capabilities at least in the short term to confront issues. I might have more but many times constraining. Sorry for that. So the last minister for Deputy Prime Minister. Thank you. Very shortly, in the beginning as we started the democratic process in Iraq the main idea of the main forces of the Iraqi population was to keep the army out of the interior conflicts to limit the activities in the defending the country from the threats which are coming from outside. But the crimes of the terrorists since 2004 or 2005 have turned that all over. So we were forced to use the army inside the country and here is the point. Here we should think that the army shouldn't be a tool of one component in the interior conflicts because it is very very high how to distinguish a terrorist from another people who have another idea or is opposing the policy of the government. That's why just to keep the army in a right way inside the country and having an effective role to tackling the terrorism there should be a political stability in the country. There should be a mutual understanding between the components of the Iraqi population on the basis of real partnership and equality. Thank you very much, Deputy Prime Minister. Thank you to all of you for an excellent panel and as I said there's no reason to leave because next panel is in quarter an hour future of intelligence services which will also be a very interesting panel. Thank you very much and thank you for your attention.


Well good evening everyone. Thank you for coming to this the second in our smart women's smart power series here at CSIS I'm Kathleen Hicks. I run the international security program and in the Henry Henry Kissinger chair here at CSIS We are here on an ash Wednesday, so I have not misapplied my makeup So thank you for for that in advance And thank you also for braving the cold weather we've had here in Washington more cold is gonna come I think while we're here, but I hope you will be warmed by the great conversation that we've put together for you tonight. I Want to thank in particular city who provides sponsorship for this series and without whom we could not put on this event this evening We have put up for you for smart women's smart power our Twitter handle Which is that smart women and of course we are broadcasting this live via webcast and tonight It's my pleasure most importantly to introduce our two Speakers most importantly the first lady of Afghanistan Rula Ghani here for the first time at CSIS as a native of Lebanon she met her husband the president of Afghanistan when they were students together the American University in Beirut she is Quite accomplished as a having earned our master's degree in journalism from Columbia University in New York and of course She's worked extensively on women's and children's issues in Afghanistan And I'm sure she'll be sharing those experiences with us here tonight Providing the moderation for this evening is as always Nina Easton who helps us host this smart women's smart power series Nina is a senior associate here at CSIS And she's also a columnist and chair of fortune's most powerful women international summit So please join me in introducing and thanking our speakers for tonight. So thank you all for coming and thank you For that terrific introduction I just wanted to give one shout out to one other piece of smart women's smart power We do which is a weekly podcast you can find it on Apple iTunes. It's right on your smartphone And it's a great way to hear women talk about pressing foreign policy matters of the day Well, thank you so much for being here, Mrs. Ghani It is just it's truly an honor And it was delightful to get to know you a little bit over the course of the couple a couple of these days It's interesting because Your predecessor the previous first lady.  I hope that I will not disappoint And I would like to say a word about Mrs. Karzai doctors you not Karzai She's indeed a doctor and she's an accomplished professional person She happened to be In her child bearing and child rearing years during the time her husband was president And I remember when I was in my child rearing and child bearing years I didn't have time for anything else. So if she chose not to have a public life, I Think it was her choice and I don't think she should be blamed for that anyway coming back to me Once I moved to the palace I Found that if I stayed at home, I would be just waiting for my husband to come back at night and You may know that my husband is a workaholic workaholic and that he will not come back till maybe quite late and I very quickly got bored so With his encouragement, I Decided to have an office and Slowly this office has grown We now are seven women Young and old. I'm the old one and We We decided to have an open-door policy. So basically I see my role more as a Listener and as a facilitator I Don't have a budget people don't come to me to get money But they come to me to talk To share their concerns to Sometimes the voice their complaints Sometimes just to let me know what they're doing and it's really wonderful because I've had women and men mostly women though and a lot of young people come and See me Maybe it was a novelty. They wanted to see who was that person who was had become the first lady Might be the reason why there are so many of you around here tonight Anyway, but also to have a chance to talk about what Is worrying him or what is interesting them their hopes Their misgivings so In the first phase, this is what my office does it's just kind of welcome people They sing to them and in the cases where we can help where it's an easy way of helping like for example picking up the phone and Obtaining an appointment for them in some government agency We do it and we have helped quite a few quite a few people Not too many but still we've made And what have you learned about the country and the state of the country in this listening tour that you're doing I'm you and I talked about the the widening gap between the provinces and the urban centers for example Yes, the first thing I discovered is that there are a lot of very strong women who are determined to better their lives that is You know, it is something that does not come in the press because the press For some reason It's like a you know a broken record that keeps saying you know poor of one women and it's true They if they are facing very difficult situations but they are facing them with a lot of resilience with a lot of strength and With a lot of resourcefulness Through their talks as you mentioned yes, I realized that there is a widening gap Between the urban areas and the provinces especially the far-flung provinces Women will come to me and say you have forgotten us Nobody comes and help us. We don't have access to Medical services. We don't have access to education Let alone legal services or other kind of more sophisticated services You see a lot of the teachers in the provinces are men and In many of these provinces many families will not send their daughters to a classroom that's led by a man The solution is very easy is to train local women to become teachers First elementary teachers and middle then upper, you know higher school We don't need to think about University yet, but There is a need to Concentrate on these women and I worry because if ever the gap increases Will be two countries will not be one country And you find you found some incredibly incredible stories of resilience among some of those women in the Provinces where security is an issue where the Taliban is an issue. Can you relate that what I call the the tea party story? Yes, this is a really inspiring story It was reported to me by a woman who came to see me from Kandahar I don't know exactly where it took place, but she told me the story of this widow who had to leave her village and go to Kabul to be able to make a living for herself and her children and On one of her visits back to the village She goes to visit a cousin who also is a widow and finds out that the cousin has been that just dislodged from her home and her little piece of land around the home very modest home Both she and her cousin are illiterate don't know how to read and write and She finds out that she's been dislodged by the newly arrived Taliban so She says, okay. I'm going to deal with it. She takes three glasses You know we drink tea in glasses in the provinces. She glasses fills a teapot a with hot hot tea and goes there enters the room and Grates the people What's the three Glasses in front of the three people I think the head was in the middle and two people were there and starts pouring tea for them and Then she sits down and she starts talking with them, you know first. It's just You know the usual Talk of how are you? Are you fine? How are your children? Your family's fine? Yes, my family's fine All this and then she starts telling them very nicely that you know, this is the house of my cousin She's a widow. Do you know she has seven children? And you know her husband has died seven years before You know, she really relies on this piece of land around the house for Having some food, you know, she she plants she cultivates it and has some and It went on one hour two hours at the third hour She kept repeating and kept saying you know at third hour without even talking to her The commander the Taliban commander takes the Kalashnikov. He had between his knees Stands up and tells his guys. Let's go. We're going to another house so Very calmly and very quietly she negotiated the Taliban getting out of the house of her cousin and Had her cousin reinstated in her house That shows you women are strong. They have their own way of doing things.  Who do you think you are and where did you come from and what are your know? but they are persistent and they Keep pushing and pushing and pushing until their voices heard and in this case it was heard Love that story. Well, you know And what what what about though a more formal role for women in peace negotiations? I mean, of course that when the Taliban came in and Forced women to wear burkas and not leave the house without a man wouldn't ban girls from schools And now you've got a 40% of students in Afghanistan are girls. There's been tremendous progress and There's pressure from a lot of organizations of Afghan women's network to to a put women at the peace table and Be talk about women's issues or women's rights as part of that process. What's your perspective on that? I think it's not yet the time for it. I Think we don't really have negotiation yet so whether or not there are women in the In the negotiating team is really a moot question Yes, there has been There has been a lot of meetings and there has been a lot of going come back and forth and going to Qatar and going to Saudi Arabia and I don't know what and I don't know what but all of this has resulted in nothing I think women have their role where they are living if They have Taliban families there to interact with those families and Often they do because you know when you coexist with other people You have issues together. Maybe there is a question of water that needs to be divided Maybe there is a question of a school that needs a teacher. Maybe there is a question. I don't know Common things when people live together. They have they share concerns and problems I don't think it's time for the women to sit at the table because there is no table yet. Okay, and the The status of women there you talked about we had this conversation about the sort of entrepreneurial spirit You're seeing of women that there's there's really a Misperception about women in Afghanistan in the media. We talked about your beautiful coat Design of that and can you talk about what kinds of companies you're seeing women get involved in? Well, I've been very surprised. I've had delegation of business women coming to me And these are not small businesses. I've had factory owners. I've had women who own Don't own who actually lease big tracks of land and Try to cultivate vegetables on it. I've had the owner women who trade in Dried nuts in carpets of course, there's also the women who trade in How Magdouzi and all this all the embroidery things Women are very savvy They just need a little bit of push. They need just a little bit of support They need a little bit of encouragement, but once they are given the space They perform They get result they get things done. I mean, I see there is maybe Half of the audiences women tonight and women know that when they put their mind to it They really get it done no matter what it is whether it's something at home or something at work if they put their mind at it they really get it done and I've been really very pleasantly surprised to see their savviness And to see what they would ask for example, they would say as Women we are not getting good Teals at the banks, you know when we go for a loan the banks will not give us Loans without us putting as collateral our whole house and You know we ask for a small loan and here they want the whole house Why don't they take for example our car as a collateral? And which is really a very reasonable thing that car is still valuable and might be the value of the loan So they are I find them usually that they will talk to me about their problems But they will tell me what is the solution so I find it much easier to help them Because if ever it's talking to a certain agency My colleagues do that and we have helped a couple of women's like that it's It's also very encouraging to see how How determined they are to make it and to make it for their daughters and for their children and and for the country a very patriotic So you gave a speech in Oslo not long ago and you said Afghan women need to reclaim their past in an Islamic tradition And you cited a number of powerful women. Can you talk about a couple of those? Yes, I Maybe it's it's kind of a The luck of the fact that I left Afghanistan just before the civil war So I left it during its heyday. I had lived four years there I lived within the family of my husband So I've lived with my in-laws with the extended family and I saw what the situation was and what of one culture really was It's a culture. That's very harmonious. Of course, there were problems like there are in any society but people lived in In harmony with each other. They knew what their place was. They knew what was expected from them There was no gap for example with the Between city and province Members of the family that lived in the province would come and stay for extended Times sometimes two weeks three weeks With us we would go back and stay with them There was a back-and-forth all the time we would spend our weekends in the closest province This is This is what I call a fun culture in which women were respected My mother-in-law my husband's grandmother Were powerful women and yet they were women that stayed at home It was not because they worked outside There were other members of the family that worked outside and they were also quite respected and I Never heard somebody say oh, she's working outside. She's you know, who is she? No on the contrary. We had one who got a PhD in history and became member of the Academy of Science another one was when the Hospital the Jumruyat Hospital Shafakhani Jumruyat was open. She got the job the procedure job of Managing she got she became the manager of the hospital. So From my little microcosm of this family I could tell that women had their place in society and their role was respected and appreciated and This is something that I would like to this is why I'm saying I want to revive a fun culture now I also saying we have to go back to our Islamic roots because in Islam women were very important especially in that in those First few decades in the 1920s. No, I'm talking. I'm talking about the Prophet's time Much longer the Queen no no no we'll talk about the Queen later. Yeah, anyway, but in Islam the you know The Prophet married one of the most important traders of Saudi Arabia and she was a woman You know this woman had caravans that were going all the way to the Mediterranean and all the way to the Persian Gulf his his daughter married Ali against She had lots of suitors, but she preferred to marry for love. So that's again in other interesting Notion that marriage for love You know there were the The sister of Hassan and Hussein They were the one who did You know kind of fought they were warriors and they really fought so What I'm trying to say is that it's the Islam the place of women is an important place the the kind of Islam that is now Taking places is being kind of Presented to all the young generation. It's no longer that it's it's it's actually not Islam. It's just a I don't know a I wouldn't say it's a variation because it's not variation. It's totally it's something else. I was I was making a speech one day for a an event that was about midwives and OBGYN doctors and Do you know that in Islam it says very in the Holy Quran? It says very clearly that there should be 30 months between children between The birth of children it says it very clearly For the health of the child and for the health of the mother So for for Christ's sake, I mean This this distortion of Islam we should not accept them we should really kind of get back to The basis to what really it is go back to the text study them and understand them Now you mentioned Queen Suraya Queen Suraya was in The wife of Abdul Rahman King Abdul Rahman in the at the beginning of the 20th century in the 1920s She was an educated woman and She became the minister of education she held a cabinet position and It seems to me it's my guess that she really is the person who built the foundation For a very strong Educational system that existed in Afghanistan before the Civil War the education system which gave gave Birth I know I mean who which allowed people like my husband to arrive for his University studies my husband and his cohort when they came to the American University of Beirut They had no problem adjusting They knew as much as the others and actually sometimes they had covered in things like physics and chemistry They had covered the subjects that there were were being told told to freshmen We had a wonderful Educational system thanks to Queen Suraya who sent a lot of people on scholarship But insisted that they should study Education they wanted to become doctors Engineers lawyers what have you know they had to study education They came back and they were they had master and had master's of the schools They were the professors in the new University and they did a great job Educating generations of Afghans and this is why the older generation of Afghans are all very well read very well Educated know what they're talking about know their history and all their geography and all their science And thanks to this one woman So I think of one woman already when they they put their their mind to it. They're really quite formidable and let's talk about you speaking of Someone who seems almost like a role model, but you were raised Lebanese Christian In a pretty illustrious family talk about what your father did My father My father came from modest Background, but had his scholarship and went and studied agriculture in in Lebanon in France at the time I'm French educated by the way, but When he came back he proceeded to To really put together the agriculture of the country he introduced Various varieties of fruits varieties of new varieties of vegetables He introduced fertilizers insecticides pesticides Eventually he got into water treatment into food industries He was really quite a pioneer and even at one point he was Approach to become the head of the FAO But my mother said no, I'm not leaving Lebanon And so he stayed at home. So you study you left though you studied in Paris You talked about 1968 and the uprisings having an impact on your thinking well, I I was there and the Pension the family in which I left Was in the middle of all the events. So I was a in first lines to see what was happening. I did not take part Because at the time I was still very young and that didn't really understand what was happening But it's certainly what stayed with me is that you can be an agent of change By seeing what was happening in May 68 seeing all these Students trying to change the curriculum change the way Teaching was done in in France at the time. It was done in a very Hierarchical way nothing like the American system You attended large classes probably larger than this the number of students and Down there would be the teacher who'd do his lecture and that would be it Then you had to study on your own and nothing like and so they they wanted to change that system and I think they did Change it in some ways like all revolutions some things stuck some things did not didn't and then you You worked as a journalist for a time. You were studied at Columbia Journalism at Columbia and how did that affect? Your thinking and how you look at things. I Love gathering information That's how it has affected me.  I am very I'm eager to understand the environment in which I am Sounds like how you're approaching your yes. Yes. Yes. Yes. This is this is the way I function. I like to know Who are the people around me? What are the problems and it happened in All places where I've lived when I was here in Washington my husband was at the World Bank and I joined Something that's called World Bank family network which welcomes new families families of new stuff and help them adapt to Washington DC and help them understand So we would see what their needs were and for example at one point They needed English classes and we come okay, we made we organized English classes some other point They needed some financial education, you know Some of them would come and didn't know how to do a budget because they always lived in big family and everybody taking care of them. So we had Financial classes with budget first and then it went all the gamut till we had an investment club, too Which is still functioning. I saw them the other day I I do like to Solve problems So maybe it's this combination of trying to get the information and then solving the problems So being raised Lebanese Christian you and you started down a professional path, but you had small children and you Ended up in Afghanistan with your husband was was there a cultural Any kind of cultural Barriers to you there or did you fit right in you did not convert to Islam? No, I did not Afghanistan is I I I spent four years in Afghanistan as a as a young bride then we went to the States and We came here for my husband's PhD and ended up staying 30 years because of the civil war and actually It was advised My husband was advised not to go back because most of his family was put in prison at the time. So we stayed but The four years when I came to Afghanistan were very easy to me Lebanese culture and Afghan culture are not very different We eat the same food We have the same respect for elders. We We have the same way of being welcoming to guests of you know, it's I remember once I Had just I don't know if I was already married or because I went to first as a my my father came to me as a fiancee and then we got married in Lebanon and Went back to Kabul, but I remember there is this couple that came and they were young Maybe two or three years they had been married, but he was Afhan and she was German and they had a little boy and She was surprised that I was so relaxed and She was she had come they had come to visit us and she was with her mother-in-law And I must say her mother-in-law was a little bit formidable, but anyway, but she said, you know How how can you manage I said what is there to manage and she says well when we sit at the table My mother-in-law is always saying here take eat. Why don't you eat from that? Why don't you take that? Why don't you take that? I said, but she's she's taking care of you. She's showing respect She's showing she likes you. Oh, she said I thought but I told her no and once I say no It's no she should not insist So for her it was a clash of culture But for me, I knew that my mother would have done exactly the same thing back home or any Italian mother would do the same You've been you're you are an Afghan citizen, but nevertheless you were criticized by some for not being Islamic During the campaign not being Islamic not being in your Lebanese roots Some people saying we should just country shouldn't have you as first lady did that how did that? How did you deal with that a lot of people say a lot of things? Yeah Okay Yes, you say I'm Christian I was born in a Christian family, but I was an Eastern Christian with meant that we Prayed in Arabic. So Muslims pray in Arabic and when you pray to God, there's that's much vocabulary For praying, you know, so it was pretty much the same So I don't feel uncomfortable for example saying Muslim prayers because they're exactly or pretty much like My Christian prayers. So for me, it's not a difference whether I'm Muslim or Christian and For the people for all the delegation that comes to see me. It hasn't never been an issue They are just happy that I'm there that I'm Opening my doors to them that I'm listening to what they have to say and that maybe I'll be able to help them And it seems like that works well I've been told you you've got a caretaker gene you like to take care of people when you came back to Afghanistan You got involved in the school Asean. Can you describe that? Yes, Asean is a school that was started by Afghans and to take care of the children who work on the streets and I've always liked that organization because The children are the ones that pay the price of civil war Because they find themselves with either with no parents or with parents that have been debilitated or have no Not not able to work and they are the ones who are have to earn a living for the family and So I've tried to help Asean as much as I could Basically whenever there was we had the dinner at home and there were some foreigners I would tell them about Asean and Often some of them would come and visit and would make a donation and little by little we created an Asean foundation here in the States so that American supporters could benefit from the 501c tax deduction and yet to help a institution that they really liked so this is what Asean is and Well, I've heard about it for years I should say from Trish Silverman who is right here and is partly responsible for you being here Yes, thank you Trish and actually Mary Jo Myers the head of the foundation now is Sitting right there to welcome I Love how you are very outspoken about a lot of things and one of them in your speech You made the point that international aid has created a culture of dependency In the country, how would you go about? First, how does that manifest itself and secondly, how would you go about tackling that? Okay, what I mean by that is that humanitarian assistance is wonderful But it's a short-lived and it does not change the situation Bringing food bringing blankets bringing bringing Tents bringing floor covers All that is wonderful for people who really need it But you come back the next year and they're still there and there are even more people that are there I Don't think that humanitarian assistance is the answer And Especially don't send clothes Kabul has a whole market of second-hand clothes Anyway, what I think needs to be done is to get to the roots of the problem Why are these people in camps? Why are they? I mean they're usually internally displaced people They've been displaced maybe because of Civil war where they are they may have been displaced because some warlord decided to take away their land They may have been displaced because there has been a flood or a landslide The problem. I mean the solution to this problem is not to bring them every year that much, you know, they were well-known ration of fries sugar flour Oil cooking oil two blankets and one tarp. It does not solve the problem So basically what I would like from the agencies the international aid People is to stop thinking in term of humanitarian assistance and start thinking in terms of development and develop developing institutions means training people Doesn't it's very easy to come and to help and to say here. I'm going to show you how it's done No, you know, it's like I was at a dinner recently and they were talking about how The Afghans are at the wheel and they're having their hands on the wheel also to help them Stir and I said no take off their your hands from the wheel let them drive as if it was a Driving school car and you have a Emergency brake next to you. You can pull if ever something wrong, but let them drive Let them learn to drive as long as you have the hands off the wheel They will not learn how to drive you will leave and everything will fall apart So basically what I'm trying to say is really train people To lead train people to be in charge Let the main mistakes people learn from their mistakes They're not learning. They're not going to learn by seeing you do things So basically this is how I'm trying to tackle it I'm not really quite sure how I'm going to do it. Are there models that You would cite as that's the way to do it Not that I know of I'm sure there are but I'm sure my husband my husband knows and I'll rely on him to tell me Speaking of training people one of that your other frustrations is that Afghans who go to the West to become educated to go to university and then don't want to come back And you you want to talk about that more you told me yes. Yes There have been quite a few young people who have had scholarship to come and study I know that in the United States there are about 300 of them This year all together. So it gives you an idea. It has started several years back. So there have been quite a few There is a tendency For them not to want to come back to Afghanistan and here I would like to say I Don't know if there are some here in the audience, but please Remember this money was given to you Not because of your beautiful eyes It was given to you because you are going to go back to your country and help rebuild your country So at least you spend two years here go spend two years back in Kabul Then you want to come back to the States well and good I have no problems, but you have at least to repay all this money that has been spent on you now somebody Mentioned that I should say You know the amount that was spent on you. This is the amount yet You should repay if you want to stay in the state. I think this might be a little too harsh, but still If ever it comes to that that's what our advice to do People should have should feel that they have to come back and help their country how is this country going to grow if the people that we train and We send to the best universities here decide. Oh, well, I'd rather stay here. I tell you So I'm gonna ask one more question and we're gonna open this up to audience questions I Want to remind you it needs to be a short question. It has to end with a question mark and not and not be Getting on a soapbox But let me ask you you've got a room full of people. I've heard you say a number of times You've got cameras. I've heard you say a number of times that you're frustrated with the coverage of Afghanistan and the the image that's portrayed in the the Western media tell us What is the real Afghanistan that we're missing? Okay? You have to understand Foreign NGOs foreign agencies need to justify why they are working in Afghanistan So they need to say That the sky is falling, you know, they need to say oh the situation is terrible. It's horrible Because otherwise they will not be able to raise the funds. They need to function there. Okay, so somehow this has kind of Gotten to the Journalists and I think it's laziness on the part of the journalist because they just need to go around and see for themselves and I've read somewhere that all of Afghanistan is the worst country for a girl to be born in How gosh, it's not true There there are difficult situations. There are difficult Challenges But still you can have a good life in Afghanistan We need to work for it. We need to improve it There is a lot of room for improvement, but it's a beautiful country and it's a beautiful people so basically what I resist is When I see an article that tries that oh everything is going wrong in Afghanistan or the the economy is going Is falling apart? Oh You know security. There is no security in Afghanistan 34 million people live in Afghanistan and you know Maybe I don't know the number of people that are being killed and it's really too much every every life counts But it's probably less than the number of people that get killed on the on the roads here in the United States so Let's keep a Relative view. Let's be a little more upbeat about the country it's Also now there is a change. It's a new administration. There are real hopes that Certain things that the press has criticized at length like corruption and like Like of governance so nepotism and all this Maybe these things are going to be tackled a little better So let's be hopeful. Let's be positive. I Think Afghanistan is going to be a beautiful country, and I hope all of you will be able one day to come and visit Right here on the front My name is Marzia and I came to the United States through the initiative to educate Afghan women program I'm very happy and it's a historical time for me today to be here to listen to my role model And I will first lady. I will never forget today And the first thing I would like to say We're gonna ask a question. We are very short period of time. Okay. Just a comment the students who don't go to Afghanistan They are working here.  You need protection and security Do you want to respond? Yeah? Yeah Yeah, I know situation is probably not ideal for girls who want to work in Afghanistan But it's getting much better and if you want to change the situation you have to be part of it That's how I think but thank you for trying to do something from here. Anyway, and I've been talking with people at the embassy and maybe by the end of the academic year We'll try to have like a job fair For you to know what kind of jobs are available in Afghanistan and to kind of connect People with qualification with jobs that would be appropriate Other questions right here Hi, my name is Margaret Rogers and I'm proud to be on the board of the Ashana Foundation I've also worked in Afghanistan. My question is about the Taliban You started out rule of saying that there was not much progress with regard to the peace talks But as somebody who has lived there in a Taliban dominated province Are there prospects for a more peaceful country given the strength of the Taliban? I don't think I see something that you don't know, but the first priority of my husband is to bring security to Afghanistan and I Have a lot of confidence in him. I think he knows how to think outside the box and how to Figure out how to solve problems. He's a problem solver too. So I hope that eventually the situation will get much better any specifics Moving forward, do you want to reveal? No, I don't know. No, I we don't live in each other's pockets. So I don't know what he's doing Back here Thank you, Rahim Rashidi from Kurdistan TV. Thank you for your time What is your opinion of Kurdish female freedom fighter? Thank you Kurdish female I am very proud of them. I think they're taking part They're taking part in defending their country and I think they're doing very well and we do have Females in the Afron army. I met the ones that are at the academy. There are all 36 of them and They're bright young women. They made me feel very proud to have them with me and I hope that They'll be able one day to defend their country too Where are the mics are the mics nearby here? Oh, I'm sorry right next to you. Yeah, right here in Hello, my name is Elise Hampton. I want to thank you for taking the time to come out this evening and speak with us My question is very simple Can you speak a little louder? Sure if there were three things and you could prioritize them in order that Afghanistan needs, what would they be? That Afghanistan needs, what would they be? I think the first thing is security the second thing is Greater order in the way the country is being managed so better management of the country and The third thing I Don't know I really feel once once there will be security and once The country is The mechanism of governing the country are really in place people will find Each person will find something that they will want to do and they will take part in in building their own country I Don't think Afghans need to be To be told that they should be proud of their country that they should serve their country. They have it It's innate in them, but it's just the circumstances were not provided Thank you, ma'am. My name is Major Mike Marron. I'm with the United States Army And I'll be deploying to Afghanistan in June for a program called AFPAC hands. What advice would you give to me? As an advisor, I'll be working with counterparts more likely with either the Ministry of Interior or Ministry of Defense I'd like to know what kind of advice would you give me when I'm Advising an Afghan. Thank you ma'am Well, thank you for your service But What I would like to say so you'll be either in the Ministry of Interior or the Ministry of Defense. Is that what you're saying? Okay Try to help bring order in those ministries And if you see corruption don't look the other way Unfortunately, I think often foreign advisors See corruption and are worried to step on people's toes and Particularly in those two ministries If you can enforce the respect of women because unfortunately it does not exist in those two ministries And we didn't touch on that much corruption. I mean, do you see that getting better? I think people are a little more Wary of engaging in corruption I'll tell you in anecdote. I don't know whether it's true or not, but I heard it when My husband became president There was a whole list of people maybe 60 names of people who wish to become ministers The minute they found out my husband was going to be president They withdrew So I think It doesn't mean that there is no corruption anymore No, there is it's systemic and I think what my husband is trying to do is to Deal with it by building systems that will make it less possible For people to be corrupt. Yes. We have time for one more Hey there, I'm Hannah and I just wanted to ask this question on behalf of all the Afghans in the West Can you talk slower and louder? Oh, sure I can I just wanted to ask this question on behalf of all the Afghans in the West the youth and I wanted to ask you What can we do to help rebelled Afghans on what do you personally believe that what areas should we focus on? Hey Let's say she wants to come back. So yes. Yes. Yes. I think it will be good at first to come for a short trip for you to see Maybe we can we had talked about organizing activities in the summer for young people who want to come back and try and help and Because you know, I don't know how much It's it's it's a personal choice and I don't want to impose on anyone to decide to stay here or to decide for them that to to go to Afghanistan come and see and We probably will be this is something we've been thinking in our I'm I'm looking at my chief of staff here and We've been talking about creating programs for young people in the summer so they would come and Get reacquainted with what and I tell you from the same family You'll have one child who just falls in love with Kabul and the other one says oh, I can't wait to go back So it it will not reflect on badly on anyone if ever they don't want to stay But if if you come and you just love it then you'll find you'll find other sectors though that really need that young talent like teaching for example or Engineering, I mean are there things that stand out in your mind. Well, there certainly must be I don't know I don't know myself, but because my children are Older, so I I don't Move in circles of very young people But I think there might be things that they can do that shana for example or they can do it organization that take care of young children or Even if ever they have a specific thing that they like For example, they like art we can get them with artists budding artists in Afghanistan or they like photography. We have photographers Associations or if they want to go in the provinces like we can find maybe some midwife to shadow Oh Something I mean, I think the possibilities are immense, but I at this point I don't know I've only been a first lady for four months So please bear with me. Well you have your work cut out for you And I just want to thank you for being not only so insightful, but frankly I think so inspirational for a lot of the people in this


Hey, yo, what's happening guys? It's your boy Nick Chay. Today we're coming back with another video now This is a topic I've been wanting to talk about for a while now because I get tons of DMs about people asking me Should I start a YouTube channel? What do I need to start a channel? You know, is it even worth it? So I thought I'd break that down for you guys today. If you guys are new to the channel welcome My name is Nicholas Chay. I make videos talking about college lifestyle fashion content creation and all of that So if that sounds interesting make sure to hit that subscribe button because like I said guys I have a lot of content coming for you, but let's not waste any time and jump right into it The question of whether or not you want to become a youtuber start a YouTube channel genuinely all comes down to Asking yourself that and it seems very simple But at the end of the day, no one should be persuading you No one should have any influence over whether or not you start a channel because that decision ultimately Starts and ends with you you're gonna make that decision to pull the trigger and start filming videos upload consistently Try to maintain this brand image and have a community and that's honestly the end goal of any youtuber It's not about the fame. It's not about the fortune It's about having a community like you guys Which I'm very grateful for to share your thoughts share your opinions and what you value into the world and hopefully make someone Else's day just a little bit better by you know uploading a video sharing your content and showing what your life looks like So at the end of the day, you need to take some deep self-reflection and ask yourself Is it really worth it because I will tell you guys right now that it is a huge commitment not just a time commitment But everything mentally physically investment wise financially You're gonna be putting in a lot of capital to purchase your first camera get some lighting get sound equipment You know travel for vlogs shopping whatever it is that you want to do on your channel So that's my most important tip is that you can't be going into this without some kind of Commitment to yourself and to your fans and your viewers that you're going to be consistent with it because there's nothing We're seeing a youtuber who has a lot of potential, you know make a few videos They're really good They start to pop off a little bit and then they just die off you never hear from them again And it's just very disappointing and it's just a waste in the youtuber community So I would hate for any of you guys to become like that Which is why I just recommend that you know make that strong value to yourself and hold yourself to it number two You need to be doing it for the right reasons If you are looking to get into the youtube community because you want to drive a nice car I have a nice mansion and travel all the time Then I hate to be the one to break it to you But that is likely not going to happen for you because any type of viewer is able to see right through that bullshit You know if you are going in with the wrong reasons and not having the right intentions for starting a youtube channel Other than to just make money and you know have a lot of Instagram followers and cloud or whatever Then people are gonna see right through that bullshit It's not authentic It's very fake and you're not gonna do well like people aren't going to enjoy watching your videos They're not going to support you in whatever you do So if you don't go in with the right intentions Then it's just gonna set off a bad foot and it's hard to recover from that Especially if you start off your reputation of you know trying to show off for all this cloud or whatever Not like someone we know on the channel right number three I think a very important decision to consider when starting a youtube channel is you need to take a step back and look at What you are doing in your life and prioritize the things that are more important So obviously if you are a student then that should be your priority unless you have a dying passion to create videos Make content for other people then you know being a student should be your full-time priority Someone like me who is more so a filmmaker and photographer and enjoys making this stuff This is a priority for me and that doesn't mean I can't balance and manage my time with my academics But I'm passionate about this. I enjoy this So if you aren't going to be able to be fully dedicated If you don't know the ins and outs of filming and editing and that's going to be a big hurdle to get over Initially, then you need to take a step back and really think and prioritize whether you need to be studying for the MCAT You need to be getting ready for grad school. You need to be doing whatever else it is That is important in your life before you know making that jump to start a YouTube channel Oh a little side tip from that is I don't think if you start a YouTube channel You need to like go all in all at once and buy all this equipment like you can start gradually You can start from the basics and with what you have I always recommend this to anyone that's starting a YouTube channel But you can literally film and vlog on your phone on any basic DSLR to shoot your sit-down videos It really wasn't until I decided that you know This can be a you know full-time or part-time thing where I made the leap and decided to you know invest in some lights Invest in some better camera and audio equipment and that just you know took my production quality a little bit higher But honestly I could still make videos anywhere I am with the phone that I have edit on you know iMovie on your computer and then upload that to YouTube it is super simple anyone can literally do it these days It's just a matter of who's gonna do it right and who's gonna put in the most work that is going to be successful now My fourth point going off of that is like I said you can't have assets Don't think that you're going to be able to put in one or two hours into making a decent video and hope that it gets Thousands of views because that is the exact opposite mentality of what will happen the amount of hours in the work that you put into a Video will be positively correlated with the impressions and the views that it gets you know That's not all the time There are times where I'll put in 20 hours into a video and it doesn't do as well as I hope But I've recently been learning that it's really just a crapshoot you need to be you know Uploading consistently and just hope that one day one of them will do well And you know there's nothing that we can do to control that algorithm, but if you have asked anything in YouTube It's not going to do well for you or for your channel So like I said you have to be fully committed you have to make sure that this is something that you're going to be wanting to Invest a lot of time financial investments lack of sleep and learning a lot now finally This is just a little mini tip. I think it's pretty important that you find a niche whether it's specific or broad You just need to find something that you can you know tackle into right away and make videos about So that you're not just being too broad and trying to you know fit too many niches all at one time So obviously for me it's college lifestyle and fashion which is a you know a bit broader than most But if you're going to beauty if you're going to music production if you're going into cooking like those are very specific niches Where you can exponentially grow faster because you're making consistent quality content about one specific subject You know as I reflect on the past year and a half almost two years of being a youtuber There's a lot of things I've learned. It's a lot about time management Prioritization which is basically what I've been telling you guys because I've learned this but it's also been a ton of fun Like I'm consistently striving to think of better video ideas how I can make better content for you What other avenues and opportunities are there for me to consider with this? Influencer life or whatever, you know, I got to meet Jimmy Fallon. I've been traveling a ton I do get you know some brand deals and sponsorships, so I'm able to you know afford the lifestyle or whatever Anyways guys that about wraps it up for this video I hope that this was helpful Especially if you guys are looking to get into YouTube if you have any questions You know feel free to shoot me a DM on Instagram my at is at Nicholas J I've been trying to respond to most of you guys and I hope that you enjoy this video as always guys If you enjoy this video make sure to drop a comment subscribe for more and as always don't stress finesse


Hello everybody, I am Dr. Akshaya Kelebi. I am a consultant physician at Padiman Hospital. We are in the peak of monsoons and seeing a lot of rainbow cases. So today, let's talk on rainbow fever. It's an infection which is caused by the virus called denu virus which is transmitted from the bite of a mosquito carrying the denu virus. Symptoms can happen anytime between 4 to 7 days after the bite from a mosquito carrying the denu virus. And the symptoms can be different for different people. It can vary from mild to severe symptoms. Most common what we see is a fever headache, the tropical pain, pain behind the eyes. They can have severe body pain, fat pain. Some people can have sore throat or cold. And few people can present with pain or vomiting or motions. There are few people who can present the severe symptoms of denu. Like they can have severe headache, ulcerative insomnia, sudden loss of consciousness. There could be seizures, things what we call in layman term. Some people can have severe abdomen pain. They can present with a different abdomen. When in few weeks, we see reading manifestations from different sites. Like reading from the lungs. They can have reading at different sites. They can have reading from the, you know, in the schools. They can have black stools. Women can have PDB reading in between the cycles. But the severe symptoms we see in only 0.5 to less than 5% of the patients. Here we need to understand the denu, the natural history of the denu in less. It usually has three phases. One is the acute febrile phase, which is followed by critical phase and then color-set phase. In acute febrile phase, it can last in between two to seven days. And as the people abuse, the critical phase setting, which can last about 48 to 72 hours. This is where we see, you know, the complications that happen in denu. Like it could be fall in platelets. The BP can go down. Like a systemic involvement can happen in this phase. And this is followed by the convulsant recovery phase, where the patients can continue to have symptoms, you know, lingering symptoms like body fatigue or going for few days to deep weeks. Diagnosis of denu depends on, you know, the type of the system description and the time the test is taken. The sensitivity and specificity of a test depends on the timing and the day of illness. For example, the denu PCR test usually detects denu as early as first to three days of illness. Between three to three to six a day, denu, LSDN, ELISA please them to detect the denu. And beyond six days to up to at some second weeks, we can do denu, IT, and ELISA. So the test to diagnose denu depends on the day of illness, when the test is taken and the physician's description. There is no specific anti-viral against the denu virus. All the treatment is newly symptomatic and supportive. Like most of the people who have mild symptoms, we treat it with a simple task of all adequate hydration, good rest, and supportive treatment. And people who are hospitalized, even if they give IV-2, IV-2, IV-5, and symptomatic supportive care. The patients are transfused when the patients come for less than 10,000 or if the patient has a major viewing issues. No, the denu is not transfused. There is a human-to-human direct transmission. Yes, but it can happen if a mosquito fights an infected human being and the virus replicates in the mosquito. It takes around 8 to 10 days for the virus to replicate in the mosquito. And then this is called external intubation period. And this mosquito carries the denu virus. If it bites a healthy human being, then the person can be infected with denu. So there is a no direct human-to-human transmission by touching or holding hands. But yes, it can be transmitted through the mosquito bites. We can prevent denu by, of course, preventing from getting bitten by the mosquito carry the denu virus. And we have to take all the measures to keep ourselves fully covered with the clothings, wearing the food shirts and, you know, good pants, and taking care of trying to clear all the water-clothed areas around us because these water-clothed areas are the fertile ground for breeding of mosquitoes. And also, we should make sure that we use the mosquito repellents, nets, screens, and avoid getting bitten by the mosquito. Hence, they can be prevented. But if you get infected, don't worry. You can contact your physician. They are always there to help you guide you. And always remember that all negative patients who are infected may not require denution and all patients don't require daily transmission. Thank you.


This study examined the effects of gender and perceived stress on burnout levels among Lithuanian university coaches before and after the coronavirus pandemic. The findings suggest that perceived stress after the pandemic was associated with higher levels of burnout for all three burnout components, exhaustion, depersonalization and reduced accomplishment. These results highlight the importance of addressing stress management strategies for coaches during times of crisis. This article was authored by Ramu Aldous Malanaskis and Dileja Malanaskine.