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National Security Challenges and U.S. Military Activities in the Greater Middle East and Africa

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i [H.A.S.C. No. 116–10] NATIONAL SECURITY CHALLENGES AND U.S. MILITARY ACTIVITIES IN THE GREATER MIDDLE EAST AND AFRICA COMMITTEE ON ARMED SERVICES HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES ONE HUNDRED SIXTEENTH CONGRESS FIRST SESSION HEARING HELD MARCH 7, 2019 U.S. GOVERNMENT PUBLISHING OFFICE 36–296 WASHINGTON : 2019 COMMITTEE ON ARMED SERVICES ONE HUNDRED SIXTEENTH CONGRESS ADAM SMITH, Washington, Chairman SUSAN A. DAVIS, California WILLIAM M. ‘‘MAC’’ THORNBERRY, Texas JAMES R. LANGEVIN, Rhode Island JOE WILSON, South Carolina RICK LARSEN, Washington ROB BISHOP, Utah JIM COOPER, Tennessee MICHAEL R. TURNER, Ohio JOE COURTNEY, Connecticut MIKE ROGERS, Alabama JOHN GARAMENDI, California K. MICHAEL CONAWAY, Texas JACKIE SPEIER, California DOUG LAMBORN, Colorado TULSI GABBARD, Hawaii ROBERT J. WITTMAN, Virginia DONALD NORCROSS, New Jersey VICKY HARTZLER, Missouri RUBEN GALLEGO, Arizona AUSTIN SCOTT, Georgia SETH MOULTON, Massachusetts MO BROOKS, Alabama SALUD O. CARBAJAL, California PAUL COOK, California ANTHONY G. BROWN, Maryland, Vice BRADLEY BYRNE, Alabama Chair SAM GRAVES, Missouri RO KHANNA, California ELISE M. STEFANIK, New York WILLIAM R. KEATING, Massachusetts SCOTT DESJARLAIS, Tennessee FILEMON VELA, Texas RALPH LEE ABRAHAM, Louisiana ANDY KIM, New Jersey TRENT KELLY, Mississippi KENDRA S. HORN, Oklahoma MIKE GALLAGHER, Wisconsin GILBERT RAY CISNEROS, Jr., California MATT GAETZ, Florida CHRISSY HOULAHAN, Pennsylvania DON BACON, Nebraska JASON CROW, Colorado JIM BANKS, Indiana XOCHITL TORRES SMALL, New Mexico LIZ CHENEY, Wyoming ELISSA SLOTKIN, Michigan PAUL MITCHELL, Michigan MIKIE SHERRILL, New Jersey JACK BERGMAN, Michigan KATIE HILL, California MICHAEL WALTZ, Florida VERONICA ESCOBAR, Texas DEBRA A. HAALAND, New Mexico JARED F. GOLDEN, Maine LORI TRAHAN, Massachusetts ELAINE G. LURIA, Virginia PAUL ARCANGELI, Staff Director WILL T. JOHNSON, Professional Staff Member MARK MOREHOUSE, Professional Staff Member JUSTIN LYNCH, Clerk (II) C O N T E N T S Page STATEMENTS PRESENTED BY MEMBERS OF CONGRESS Smith, Hon. Adam, a Representative from Washington, Chairman, Committee on Armed Services ................................................................................................ 1 Thornberry, Hon. William M. ‘‘Mac,’’ a Representative from Texas, Ranking Member, Committee on Armed Services ............................................................ 3 WITNESSES Votel, GEN Joseph L., USA, Commander, U.S. Central Command .................... 6 Waldhauser, Gen Thomas D., USMC, Commander, U.S. Africa Command ....... 9 Wheelbarger, Kathryn, Acting Assistant Secretary of Defense for Internation- al Security Affairs, Department of Defense ....................................................... 3 APPENDIX PREPARED STATEMENTS: Votel, GEN Joseph L. ....................................................................................... 72 Waldhauser, Gen Thomas D. ........................................................................... 114 Wheelbarger, Kathryn ...................................................................................... 53 DOCUMENTS SUBMITTED FOR THE RECORD: [The information was not available at the time of printing.] WITNESS RESPONSES TO QUESTIONS ASKED DURING THE HEARING: Ms. Haaland ...................................................................................................... 155 Ms. Houlahan .................................................................................................... 155 QUESTIONS SUBMITTED BY MEMBERS POST HEARING: Mr. Brown ......................................................................................................... 161 Mr. Gallego ........................................................................................................ 159 Ms. Haaland ...................................................................................................... 165 Mr. Keating ....................................................................................................... 163 Mr. Langevin ..................................................................................................... 159 Ms. Sherrill ....................................................................................................... 164 Ms. Speier ......................................................................................................... 159 Mr. Waltz .......................................................................................................... 165 (III) NATIONAL SECURITY CHALLENGES AND U.S. MILITARY ACTIVITIES IN THE GREATER MIDDLE EAST AND AFRICA HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES, COMMITTEE ON ARMED SERVICES, Washington, DC, Thursday, March 7, 2019. The committee met, pursuant to call, at 10:01 a.m., in room 2118, Rayburn House Office Building, Hon. Adam Smith (chairman of the committee) presiding. OPENING STATEMENT OF HON. ADAM SMITH, A REPRESENTA- TIVE FROM WASHINGTON, CHAIRMAN, COMMITTEE ON ARMED SERVICES The CHAIRMAN. Good morning. I call the meeting to order. Welcome. Before we get started, just one quick announcement. I made the announcement yesterday and sent it around. We are going to, on the questioning, go in reverse order this morning, so least senior and on up. So welcome to this hearing. We are having our posture hearing this morning focusing on CENTCOM [U.S. Central Command] and AFRICOM [U.S. Africa Command], and we are very honored this morning to have with us General Thomas Waldhauser, who is the Commander of U.S. Africa Command; and General Joseph Votel, who is the Commander of U.S. Central Command; as well as Ms. Kathryn Wheelbarger, who is the Acting Assistant Secretary of De- fense for International Security Affairs. I want to begin by thanking General Votel and General Wald- hauser. I know you are very sad that this is your last opportunity to testify before Congress and have this hearing, but I want to make special note of it and thank you both for years of outstanding service to our country. It has been a pleasure working with both of you. And this morning we are going to hear specifically from you about what is going on in your areas of responsibility, and they are areas where there is a lot going on in terms of our national security concerns. Beginning in Africa, we have a presence throughout that conti- nent, and there are a number of issues we are concerned about. I think it begins with the threat from transnational terrorist groups, both in the Horn of Africa and in West Africa as well. We look for- ward to hearing an update on how our efforts are going there, both to keep those transnational terrorist threats at bay, also how are we working with our various partners both in the region and allies in NATO [North Atlantic Treaty Organization] to help contain that threat. (1) 2 And then the overall issue in that region continues to be sta- bility, particularly in Somalia and Libya, and how are we doing on building sustainable governments in those places so that we can re- duce the threat. We are also curious, as we have made the transition from better than a decade of primarily focusing on the transnational terrorist threats to a new era of great power conflict in Russia and China. And Russia and China I know are involved throughout Africa, also in various places within the CENTCOM responsibility, so hearing about what they are up to as well will be of concern. In CENTCOM, we continue to have a specific focus on Iraq and Syria as the caliphate is just about wiped out, but ISIS [Islamic State of Iraq and Syria] is still a presence in that region, as are other transnational terrorist threats, and certainly the same is true in Afghanistan. So getting an update on that is our primary con- cern. Now, as a general rule, we want to try to get to the point where we do not have to have a military presence in as many places in the world as we have. That is my personal objective. We would like to rely on partners, reduce the necessity of us having troops abroad, but at the same time, we have to make sure that we are meeting our national security objectives and protecting ourselves from that. And the one comment I will make, and I know this is not either of your gentlemen’s doing, but we need a consistent policy that our allies can rely on. I think it is problematic when we make dramatic altering decisions in what seems like the blink of an eye in a Presi- dential tweet. It is not that I don’t think we need to get to the point where we reduce our troop presence in Syria and Afghanistan; it is just not something we should do in that ad hoc a manner. It catches our allies off guard and creates problems. I was reading extensively where it has significantly damaged our relationship with President Macron in France. He was caught com- pletely by surprise by our decision that we were going to pull out of Syria. Now, the truth is, we are building towards a drawdown in Syria. The point was, you know, we wanted to build up to defeat ISIS, re- move the caliphate, and get to the point where we could pass re- sponsibility off to partners in the region. And if we had discussions with our allies and announced those plans in a rational way, I think that would help maintain the strength of our alliances. So we are concerned by the way the pol- icy seems to bounce around from day to day. The same is true in Afghanistan, as the announcement was made a couple months back that we were going to—I believe the tweet was completely pull out of Afghanistan. I know that hasn’t hap- pened and I know there has been updates since then, but a more consistent policy, I think, would help
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