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20–173PDF 2016

U.S. DEPARTMENT OF STATE COUNTERTERRORISM

BUREAU: FY 2017 BUDGET

HEARING

BEFORE THE

SUBCOMMITTEE ON TERRORISM, 

NONPROLIFERATION, AND TRADE

OF THE

COMMITTEE ON FOREIGN AFFAIRS 

HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES

ONE HUNDRED FOURTEENTH CONGRESS

SECOND SESSION

MAY 17, 2016

Serial No. 114–161

Printed for the use of the Committee on Foreign Affairs

(

Available via the World Wide Web: http://www.foreignaffairs.house.gov/ or

http://www.gpo.gov/fdsys/

(II)

COMMITTEE ON FOREIGN AFFAIRS 

EDWARD R. ROYCE, California, Chairman 

CHRISTOPHER H. SMITH, New Jersey 

ILEANA ROS-LEHTINEN, Florida 

DANA ROHRABACHER, California 

STEVE CHABOT, Ohio 

JOE WILSON, South Carolina 

MICHAEL T. MCCAUL, Texas 

TED POE, Texas 

MATT SALMON, Arizona 

DARRELL E. ISSA, California 

TOM MARINO, Pennsylvania 

JEFF DUNCAN, South Carolina 

MO BROOKS, Alabama 

PAUL COOK, California 

RANDY K. WEBER SR., Texas 

SCOTT PERRY, Pennsylvania 

RON DESANTIS, Florida 

MARK MEADOWS, North Carolina 

TED S. YOHO, Florida 

CURT CLAWSON, Florida 

SCOTT DESJARLAIS, Tennessee 

REID J. RIBBLE, Wisconsin 

DAVID A. TROTT, Michigan 

LEE M. ZELDIN, New York 

DANIEL DONOVAN, New York 

ELIOT L. ENGEL, New York 

BRAD SHERMAN, California 

GREGORY W. MEEKS, New York 

ALBIO SIRES, New Jersey 

GERALD E. CONNOLLY, Virginia 

THEODORE E. DEUTCH, Florida 

BRIAN HIGGINS, New York 

KAREN BASS, California 

WILLIAM KEATING, Massachusetts 

DAVID CICILLINE, Rhode Island 

ALAN GRAYSON, Florida 

AMI BERA, California 

ALAN S. LOWENTHAL, California 

GRACE MENG, New York 

LOIS FRANKEL, Florida 

TULSI GABBARD, Hawaii 

JOAQUIN CASTRO, Texas 

ROBIN L. KELLY, Illinois 

BRENDAN F. BOYLE, Pennsylvania

AMY PORTER, Chief of Staff THOMAS SHEEHY, Staff Director

JASON STEINBAUM, Democratic Staff Director 

SUBCOMMITTEE ON TERRORISM, NONPROLIFERATION, AND TRADE

TED POE, Texas, Chairman 

JOE WILSON, South Carolina 

DARRELL E. ISSA, California 

PAUL COOK, California 

SCOTT PERRY, Pennsylvania 

REID J. RIBBLE, Wisconsin 

LEE M. ZELDIN, New York 

WILLIAM KEATING, Massachusetts 

BRAD SHERMAN, California 

BRIAN HIGGINS, New York 

JOAQUIN CASTRO, Texas 

ROBIN L. KELLY, Illinois 

(III)

C O N T E N T S 

Page

WITNESS 

Mr. Justin Siberell, Acting Coordinator for Counterterrorism, Bureau of 

Counterterrorism, U.S. Department of State .................................................... 3

LETTERS, STATEMENTS, ETC., SUBMITTED FOR THE HEARING 

Mr. Justin Siberell: Prepared statement ............................................................... 6

APPENDIX 

Hearing notice .......................................................................................................... 24

Hearing minutes ...................................................................................................... 25

(1)

U.S. DEPARTMENT OF STATE 

COUNTERTERRORISM BUREAU: 

FY 2017 BUDGET 

TUESDAY, MAY 17, 2016

HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES,

SUBCOMMITTEE ON TERRORISM, NONPROLIFERATION, AND TRADE,

COMMITTEE ON FOREIGN AFFAIRS,

Washington, DC. 

The subcommittee met, pursuant to notice, at 2:03 p.m., in room 

2172, Rayburn House Office Building, Hon. Ted Poe (chairman of 

the subcommittee) presiding. 

Mr. POE. The subcommittee will come to order. 

Without objection, all members may have 5 days to submit statements, questions, and extraneous materials for the record, subject 

to the length limitation in the rules. 

The purpose of this hearing is to examine the budget for the Department of State Counterterrorism Bureau, Fiscal Year 2017. I 

have a lengthy opening statement, but without objection, I will 

make it a part of the record and make some brief comments. 

The purpose of this is to determine the Counterterrorism Bureau’s budget. Terrorism is on the rise throughout the world in different places, especially with ISIS. In any event, the administration 

has asked for a reduction in the Counterterrorism Bureau budget 

even though that to me is counterproductive in the sense that terrorism is on the rise. 

On the other hand, my concern is about evaluations that have or 

have not been made by the success of what the Counterterrorism 

Bureau is doing or not doing. Personally, I am not satisfied that 

the evaluation of how the money is being spent and what we are 

doing is working. So the purpose of this hearing is to examine both 

of those, whether the budget should be cut or raised and whether 

the evaluations are being produced and what are the results of 

those evaluations. 

Without objection, I will allow now the former ranking member 

of the committee, Mr. Sherman, to make an opening statement 

from California. You are recognized. 

Mr. SHERMAN. Thank you. I will use my opening statement to 

renew the plea I have been making for the State Department for 

at least 5 years and that is that you employ a few individuals who 

are hired solely for their knowledge of Islamic jurisprudence, Islamic history, and Islamic law. To think that we can combat Islamic extremist terrorism without a single person at the State DeVerDate 0ct 09 2002 17:18 Jun 09, 2016 Jkt 000000 PO 00000 Frm 00005 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6633 F:\WORK\_TNT\051716\20173 SHIRL
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partment who has memorized the Quran means that we don’t understand the mental world, the theological world that our potential 

adversaries live in. 

We have a State Department with people who think that you can 

show the evil of al-Baghdadi if you can show him personally executing a defenseless Yazidi. The fact is they will put that up on 

their Web page as a recruitment tool. We need people who understand that if you could just get a picture of him eating a ham sandwich, that would undermine ISIS and its recruiting ability. 

I remember the conflict between the United States and Indonesia 

over whether Indonesia would give us samples of avian flu and 

called an Islamic scholar who said, well, we would turn to the 

hadith about what the prophet said about rabies, which is, after 

all, just another virus that infects an animal. That is not the kind 

of knowledge that you can get at Princeton. Woodrow Wilson did 

a great job. He did not memorize the Quran. 

So we need State Department people to be able to have access 

onsite to that kind of scholarship and to an understanding of Islamic jurisprudence that is every bit as sophisticated as the knowledge we have on the Vienna Convention on the Law of Treaties and 

why the Habsburgs took this or that position in the negotiations 

in 18 whatever when that—we have a Eurocentric body of knowledge in a very smart State Department, and we are going to have 

to hire just a few people who would never pass the test because it 

is written by the Woodrow Wilson school and instead could pass 

the test to demonstrate a real knowledge of Islam. 

With that, I yield back. 

Mr. POE. I thank the gentleman. 

The chair recognizes the ranking member and gentleman from 

Massachusetts for his opening statement. 

Mr. KEATING. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, for conducting this 

hearing. I would also like to thank our witness, Mr. Siberell, for 

being here to discuss the State Department’s Counterterrorism Bureau. 

In our country’s fight against terrorism, one indelible truth has 

been stated over and over, and it is in order to truly degrade and 

ultimately defeat foreign terrorists, organizations like ISIS and alQaeda, we need a whole government-effort approach. The capacitybuilding programs funded and coordinated by the State Department’s Counterterrorism Bureau are the types of activities in 

which our Government must continue to engage if we are to be successful in achieving the Bureau’s mission of forging partnerships 

with our partners at home and abroad in counterterrorism law enforcement, counter-threat financing, counter-radicalization efforts, 

border security, and restricted terrorist travel. 

Undoubtedly, the Bureau has worked to accomplish these critical 

objectives while the State Department has revamped its efforts to 

tackle one of the hardest aspects of counterterrorism, and that is 

combating violent extremism. 

The new Center for Global Engagement is attempting to effectively coordinate, integrate, and synchronize messaging to foreign 

audiences that undermines the disinformation espoused by violent 

extremist groups. To be sure, this is not an easy task, and we will 

3

hear in detail from Mr. Siberell on the challenges facing the Bureau. 

I am particularly interested in hearing how leadership has addressed a Government Accountability Office report released last 

year on resources, performance, and coordination within the Bureau. 

Finally, it is vital that we ensure that funds appropriated, the 

Counterterrorism Bureau for these capacity-building programs are 

being used wisely, and the United States is getting a good return 

on its investment. 

As I stated at the beginning, the Counterterrorism Bureau plays 

a critical role in our fight against terrorism, particularly with regards to interagency and regional collaboration. I look forward to 

hearing from our witness today and to discuss the issues that will 

ensure. 

I yield back. 

Mr. POE. I thank the gentleman. 

Without objection, the witness’ prepared statement will be made 

part of the record. I ask that the witness keep the presentation to 

no more than 5 minutes. 

I will introduce the witness that we have. Mr. Justin Siberell is 

the acting coordinator for the Bureau of Counterterrorism at the 

State Department. He is a career member of the Senior Foreign 

Service and before joining the CT Bureau, he served as a principal 

officer in Dubai, and he has also worked in Iraq, Jordan, Egypt, 

and Panama. 

So thank you for being here, and you are recognized. 

STATEMENT OF MR. JUSTIN SIBERELL, ACTING COORDINATOR FOR COUNTERTERRORISM, BUREAU OF COUNTERTERRORISM, U.S. DEPARTMENT OF STATE 

Mr. SIBERELL. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Chairman Poe, Ranking Member Keating, members of the subcommittee, thank you for 

the opportunity to appear before you today. 

This afternoon, I would like to briefly highlight the Bureau of 

Counterterrorism’s work to advance the foremost counterterrorism 

priorities of the United States. 

As you noted, Mr. Chairman, I have submitted a longer statement for the record. 

As you know, the United States faces a fluid and fast-changing 

terrorism threat environment. The international community has 

made progress in degrading terrorism safe havens, but terrorist 

groups, especially ISIL and al-Qaeda, remain resilient. 

Recent attacks in Bamako, Beirut, Brussels, Jakarta, and Paris 

have demonstrated the reach and continued determination of these 

groups to commit violence against civilians. These and other attacks have raised the urgency and political will of our partners to 

act against the evolving threat posed by ISIL, al-Qaeda, and their 

affiliates. 

President Obama has called for the United States to develop 

more effective partnerships around the world to confront, disrupt, 

and defeat the global threat from terrorism. The Bureau of Counterterrorism is playing a critical role in developing those partnerships. 

4

Success of U.S. counterterrorism efforts increasingly depends 

upon capable civilian partners, police, prosecutors, border and aviation security personnel, prison officials, and community leaders. As 

with our own domestic experience, these actors are on the 

frontlines in preventing and responding to terrorism in their communities. 

The Bureau is leading efforts to build capacity and cooperation 

among these various civilian actors. We appreciate the Congress’ 

appropriation of $175 million for the Counterterrorism Partnership’s Fund in Fiscal Year 2016. We ask for your continued support 

in Fiscal Year 2017. With these resources we will strengthen the 

ability of key law enforcement and criminal justice actors from the 

Sahel to Southeast Asia. We are focusing on supporting countries 

that can help prevent ISIL’s global expansion while not losing sight 

of al-Qaeda and its affiliates. 

We are expanding our engagement with European partners to 

ensure they enhance capabilities to stem the flow of foreign terrorist fighters, improve information-sharing, and disrupt local terrorist recruitment networks. We believe these efforts are yielding 

results. Since 2014, 45 countries with which we have engaged have 

passed new laws or updated existing laws to address foreign terrorist fighters. 

Through the Bureau’s diplomatic efforts, we now have enhanced 

information-sharing arrangements with 55 countries to assist efforts to identify, track, and deter the travel of known and suspected 

terrorists. We have also supported INTERPOL to enhance its ability to share critical foreign terrorist fighter identity data with countries around the world. Fifty-eight countries plus the United Nations now contribute foreign terrorist fighter profiles to 

INTERPOL. 

As part of our Fiscal Year 2017 request, we have also asked for 

additional funding for our Terrorist Interdiction Program. This program provides a highly valuable capability for countries to 

strengthen border controls through enhanced technology and training. 

Mr. Chairman, as part of our overall strategy, we believe that we 

must increase our focus on preventing the spread of violent extremism to stop the radicalization, recruitment, and mobilization of 

people, especially young people, to engage in terrorist activities. 

Secretary Kerry has directed the Bureau of Counterterrorism to 

play the lead role in a more strategic, integrated, and ultimately 

accountable approach to countering violent extremism. As notified 

to the Congress, the Department is increasing personnel resources 

in the Bureau to support this mission and renaming the Bureau as 

the Bureau of Counterterrorism and Countering Violent Extremism. We will be working very closely with the newly established 

interagency Global Engagement Center and USAID in this effort. 

The Department has also requested additional resources for CVE 

programming in Fiscal Year 2017, including as part of the Counterterrorism Partnerships Fund to expand programs to help counter 

violent extremist recruitment and messaging. 

Finally, Mr. Chairman, as documented in our statement for the 

record, we have made changes within the Bureau over the past 

year to foster a culture of strategic planning, learning, innovation, 

5

and collaboration. We have enhanced the monitoring and evaluation of our foreign assistance programming, especially our largest 

programs. Since I last testified before this committee, we have 

launched a comprehensive third-party evaluation of our 

Antiterrorism Assistance Program. That evaluation will be completed later this month. We have also awarded a new third-party 

evaluation of our CVE programs. We look forward to briefing you 

and your staff on the results of these evaluations. 

Mr. Chairman, there is much more work to do. The terrorism 

landscape is dynamic, and we must continue to enhance and adapt 

our efforts. I am proud of what we are accomplishing at the Bureau 

of Counterterrorism. We have a talented team of people who are 

committed to the work of countering terrorism and keeping the 

country safe. 

We greatly appreciate the interest of Congress and your committee in support of these efforts. I look forward to your questions 

and our discussion. Thank you. 

[The prepared statement of Mr. Siberell follows:]

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Mr. POE. I thank the gentleman. 

The House is in the midst of a series of votes, so the subcommittee will recess until 5 minutes after the last vote has ended. 

So the subcommittee is in recess. We will reconvene 5 minutes 

after the last vote has ended. 

[Recess.] 

Mr. POE. The subcommittee will come to order. 

I will recognize myself for 5 minutes for a few questions. 

I have three questions, and we have 5 minutes to get the questions and the answers. So my first question is the administration 

maintains that counterterrorism is a top priority, but why is the 

administration wanting a budget cut? 

Mr. SIBERELL. Mr. Chairman, I think if you look at the annual 

requests that go from Fiscal Year 2015, 2016, 2017, you will find 

a significant increase in the ’17 request from our ’15 budget. And 

the reason is that we received a significant increase in ’16 out of 

the Counterterrorism Partnerships Fund, an additional $175 million that we are working now to develop a sound process for stewardship of those additional funds. And we very much appreciate 

the Congress’ support for that program. 

For ’17 when we put together our request, we looked at what we 

believed would be required to sustain those efforts, those increased 

efforts in ’16, and we determined that an $80 million request was 

adequate for that purpose, and bearing in mind that we want to 

ensure effective stewardship of those funds. So either 175 in ’16 addition, and then we have asked for 80 additional in ’17. So it may 

appear to be a decrease from the ’16 request because we are asking 

for less under CTPF from ’17 than we received in ’16, but overall, 

it is a significant increase. I mean, we are talking about a comparison of our request in ’17 from what our budget was in ’15 is a more 

than $50 million increase in our counterterrorism capacity-building 

foreign assistance budget. 

Mr. POE. Okay. We are not reading the same statistics, or at 

least I am not reading them the same way you are. The Counterterrorism Bureau wants 31 percent less money than last year, is 

that correct or not? 

Mr. SIBERELL. Well, I would characterize it as our effort to sustain this significant increase we received in ’16, and I will put it 

that way. 

Mr. POE. I mean is it—no, put it this way. Is it 31 percent less 

than last year or not? I don’t want to be argumentative, but I need 

or yes or no? 

Mr. SIBERELL. Yes. The $80 million we requested is less than the 

$175 we received in ’16 under the CTPF, yes. 

Mr. POE. The administration promised in 2011 that they would 

have a strategy to combat terrorists’ use of social media, 2011. 

When is that strategy going to be produced because it hasn’t been 

produced? Do you know? 

Mr. SIBERELL. The administration is working very closely internally in the United States Government with the domestic agencies, 

the FBI, Department of Justice, others——

Mr. POE. Excuse me again. 

Mr. SIBERELL. Yes. 

Mr. POE. Do you know when that is going to be done? 

17

Mr. SIBERELL. Is this the strategy you are referring to from the 

State Department? I missed the beginning of your question. 

Mr. POE. Yes, online radicalization by the terrorists’ use of social 

media, and we were going to have a strategy to combat that, and 

the President—the administration promised this in 2011. We don’t 

have it. 

Mr. SIBERELL. Okay. 

Mr. POE. When is it going to happen? 

Mr. SIBERELL. Right. So we have a strategy on countering violent 

extremism that we are just preparing to release with the State Department and USAID that does, as one of its objectives, address 

the need for effective counter-messaging and counter-narratives, 

and that is one of the five objectives in that strategy that is to be 

released within the coming week. 

Mr. POE. Within a week? 

Mr. SIBERELL. That is the State Department, USAID countering 

violent extremism strategy, joint strategy. 

Mr. POE. All right. And the last question is GAO reported that 

the CT Bureau has not evaluated its Countering Violent Extremism program despite the Bureau saying since 2012 it would 

evaluate the program. When is that going to happen? 

Mr. SIBERELL. Mr. Chairman, thank you for that question. In our 

hearing last year we discussed the importance of evaluation of CTE 

Bureau-funded Foreign Assistance Programs, and you emphasized 

the importance of this, and we have taken that very seriously. We 

have undertaken a number of evaluations, including we have put 

out a notice of funding for a comprehensive third-party evaluation 

of our Countering Violent Extremism programs in three countries: 

Indonesia, Kenya, and Bangladesh. That has been out for funding. 

It is being awarded now, and we expect that that evaluation will 

be completed by the end of this year. 

Mr. POE. So the GAO, their answer would—I mean, it hasn’t 

happened yet, and your answer is that it will be done by the end 

of the year, there will be an evaluation? 

Mr. SIBERELL. Yes. 

Mr. POE. Combating terrorism, I think we can all agree to the 

fact that it is important because terrorism is on the rise. Tell me 

why we should justify the CT Bureau? Why should Congress justify 

its existence? Try to keep it simple if you would. 

Mr. SIBERELL. Sure. I think it is a very good question, and I appreciate the opportunity to answer. 

People often think of counterterrorism as a mission for law enforcement agencies in the domestic realm or for the military or intelligence agencies in the international realm. In fact, diplomacy 

plays a key role in bringing together partnerships and nations to 

address our primary counterterrorism objectives. We see that in 

the coalitions that we build to defeat terrorist groups on a regional, 

sub-regional basis, or even a global basis. So the global coalition to 

fight ISIL is an example. The coalition of African partners we have 

developed to fight Boko Haram in West Africa, the coalition of nations we have helped to develop to fight Al-Shabaab in East Africa. 

Those are just examples of where diplomacy plays a key role, and 

the Bureau of Counterterrorism leads in a number of those efforts 

18

to build international will, political will and partnership and cooperation against these common threats. 

The other piece of what we do—and we appreciate, again, the 

funding we receive from Congress for this purpose—is to help build 

capacity in our primary counterterrorism partners. In line with the 

President’s policy of developing strong partnerships, I know the 

Counterterrorism Partnership Fund we are helping to build capacity among our partners across the civilian agencies so not just in—

and our DOD colleagues handle that on the military side, but we 

helped to build improved CT legislation, improved judicial capability to prosecute terrorist suspects, improved border security 

measures, improved civilian security agencies. 

All of those programs are funded through the support you provide to our bureau, and that is what we execute in our foreign assistance. So on the one level we are working diplomatically to build 

coalitions to address our terrorism challenges, and then we are trying to build capacity in our partners to address those in the regions 

from which these threats emanate. 

Mr. POE. Thank you. The chair recognizes the ranking member, 

the gentleman from Massachusetts, Mr. Keating. 

Mr. KEATING. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

Last week, I was in Tunisia, and the situation there was described in terms of dealing with terrorist issues there by the President himself as fragile, a term he used in our conversation at least 

10 times by my count. And you are looking at a country like that 

that is struggling to do so many things, and he kept impressing on 

us, too, and I have seen it in other countries, particularly in that 

region, where they are getting stressed, leaders are, particularly 

leaders that are trying to move forward in a way that improves democracy. 

The economic issue is just squeezing them on one end in terms 

of support. Some of the other changes that languish, too, are a 

problem. 

How is the Bureau working, you know, to coordinate not only 

counterterrorism but also rule-of-law issues? How do they factor 

that in, economic issues? Because I don’t think there will be a lasting effort with this without a strong collaboration on all of those 

issues. 

Mr. SIBERELL. Thank you for the question, Congressman. 

With Tunisia, I agree entirely that that is a country that is passing through a very important political transition but that has 

caused significant fragility within the government system. And you 

can absolutely correlate the rise of terrorist groups to failures in 

governance in certain parts of the world and certainly in North Africa and the Middle East. And we see that in Libya, obviously, and 

Yemen and other places where the government has collapsed and 

the terrorist groups rise. 

So it is absolutely important that we help the Tunisian Government through this transition, and that absolutely includes economic support to assist the government to ensure that their economy produces the jobs and hopes and opportunities for young people that have high expectations from this political transition. 

Our counterterrorism assistance is also robust with the Tunisian 

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gional groups like al-Qaeda and the Islamic Maghreb who have 

come out of Algeria and have brought threats into Tunisia. Of 

course, we have seen the attacks on the museum and the tourist 

site in Sousse. Those were planned by individuals——

Mr. KEATING. I was there. 

Mr. SIBERELL. Yes. So this is a country under assault effectively 

from these terrorist groups, and it does require a comprehensive response from us——

Mr. KEATING. Yes. I think they deserve great credit for what 

they are trying to do, but they are definitely in a very tenuous situation doing it. 

Let me just shift quickly. Twitter requested last week as well, 

one of its partners Dataminr, a service that offers advanced social 

media analytics and early detection of major events like terrorist 

attacks, to stop providing intelligence agencies with their tools and 

their content. Does this affect the relationship with the CT or with 

the Bureau of Global Engagement at all, these kind of actions? 

Mr. SIBERELL. I am sorry, sir. The action is to restrict the sharing of information with——

Mr. KEATING. Yes, with law enforcement——

Mr. SIBERELL [continuing]. Law enforcement——

Mr. KEATING [continuing]. Agencies. 

Mr. SIBERELL. Well, I think we rely upon a cooperative relationship with the social media companies, and that is primarily the 

work domestically of the FBI, Department of Justice. A cooperative 

relationship is important because those companies, through their 

terms of service, are in the best position to identify content which 

can be helpful to those groups in radicalization and——

Mr. KEATING. In terms of content, do you ever use testimonials 

from foreign fighters who have come back disillusioned? 

Mr. SIBERELL. Yes, indeed, indeed. The Global Engagement Center to which you just referred has launched several thematic campaigns to amplify messaging, including they ran a campaign of 

formers or defectors. Those who had gone off to Iraq and Syria had 

a disillusioning experience and then were putting their 

testimonials on social media as a way to push back and counter the 

narrative that ISIL has put out about its caliphates. 

Mr. KEATING. And again on messaging, and it is too bad I can’t—

we are limited with time, but on messaging, are you using women 

and community-based projects? Well, Denmark just advanced a 

program where it is concentrating on a network of mothers to identify early signs. Are you engaged in that, and how successful has 

that been? 

Mr. SIBERELL. Well, there are two things I can point to. One is 

another one of the thematic campaigns that the GEC ran, which 

was centered around families and the impact upon families of those 

who have gone off to fight for these terrorist groups. And that was 

a very effective campaign, and it did focus in large part on mothers 

and the role in the family. 

The second is we have undertaken in a number of our Countering Violent Extremism programs to focus on women because, as 

you noted, women are in a unique position in most communities to 

identify the signs of radicalization or the infiltration of ideas and 

20

ideology of the terrorist groups. So they are a primary recipient of 

our Countering Violent Extremism programming effort. 

I will also say, however, that they are difficult to reach because 

this is at the community level, and we have to get our programming down to that level. And that is why we work with partners 

like USAID who have the connections in many cases through their 

development work to reach women and build networks of women, 

which they have a history also of doing in many parts of the world 

successfully. 

Mr. KEATING. Just lastly, I will give you a chance—the GAO reported recently that there were staffing positions that weren’t filled 

and recommended that they be filled. What is the status of that 

right now? 

Mr. SIBERELL. Well, we have 102 authorized full-time employment positions in the Bureau of Counterterrorism, 93 of which are 

filled. That leaves nine vacancies, and of those nine vacancies, 

eight are in the process of being filled or being advertised. So I 

think we are doing a pretty good job in addressing what the GAO 

had found in the last several years. 

The Bureau was established as a result of the 2011 QDDR. It 

really became a bureau in 2012. We were allotted a surge of new 

positions, and it did take some time for the Bureau to process 

through those, but we have done that and now we are in fairly 

good shape and are hiring. 

Mr. KEATING. I yield back, Mr. Chairman. 

Mr. SIBERELL. Thank you, sir. 

Mr. POE. I thank the gentleman from Massachusetts. 

The chair will recognize the gentleman from California, Colonel 

Cook, for his questioning. 

Mr. COOK. Thank you very much, sir. 

I wanted to ask you about Libya and the decisions that are going 

to be made about our arming certain individuals. And of course the 

fear is here we go again. Are we giving this to ISIS, ISIL, Daesh, 

whatever acronym you want to use or whatever you call them? And 

my fear with the State Department or any is that the right hand 

does not talk to the left hand in terms of coordinating this information so we make an informed choice and then we regret it afterwards. Can you briefly comment on that? 

Mr. SIBERELL. Thank you, Congressman. In Libya it is a very difficult, fluid situation, as you have noted, basically chaotic, and you 

have militias that are squaring off against Daesh principally in the 

area around Sirte in the center of the country. Those militias are 

not yet integrated into a Libyan national force, so sharing arms or 

assisting those groups on the ground would be a complicated and 

difficult endeavor. In some cases, however, there are those substate actors who are in the best position to confront ISIL, so navigating that landscape while ensuring that those arms would no 

transfer over to ISIL would be a significant task and a very difficult one. 

Mr. COOK. I want to shift gears a little bit. Maybe this is out of 

the realm a little bit, but I am from San Bernardino County. And 

obviously, we had a very difficult and horrific situation involving 

a terrorist there. And the coordination of Federal agencies with—

21

and by the way, I was very, very happy with the way the FBI and 

the sheriff and the police chief, they all worked together. 

But in terms of—and then we had some problems with getting 

the data from the cell phone of one of the individuals, you know, 

Apple and you have heard all that drama. Now, if you have information of something that would actually affect us in the country 

here, how is that coordinated? 

And I know that is a very difficult question, but I get the feeling 

that we don’t always have the best of coordination with Federal 

agencies because everybody works in their own functional area or 

functional silo and the word is not disseminated, and what happens 

is boom, something like this happens even though we might have 

had advanced warning. But if you could comment on that, I would 

appreciate it. 

Mr. SIBERELL. Well, sir, if you are speaking about coordination 

of the domestic level among the national security agencies or the 

law enforcement agencies, I may not be the best place to——

Mr. COOK. Well, I meant somebody that had ties to a terrorist 

country that——

Mr. SIBERELL. Yes. 

Mr. COOK [continuing]. But eventually, the terrorist incident actually happens. You know, we had this a few years ago when we 

were talking about the bombings in Boston and Chechnya and we 

had talked about this previously. But——

Mr. SIBERELL. I would say that in my own experience, the counterterrorism community and the U.S. Government is extremely 

well coordinated and integrated in so far as when there is an incident like the Boston Marathon bombers and the need to understand the linkages that might exist in a different country. 

Same thing with the San Bernardino attack. There is very close 

cooperation between the FBI, the principal investigative arm of the 

U.S. Government, and FBI agents who might be posted at our Embassies abroad or representatives of the intelligence agencies who 

can help to pull back the threads on any connections. And that is 

always one of the very first questions, of course, that arises in a 

domestic terrorism incident: Is there a connection to an international organization or is this directed by a group outside the 

United States? 

And particularly for these attacks like the one in San 

Bernardino, we see ISIL trying to inspire attacks, and those questions are always asked and then referred to the host country where 

we work with the intelligence agencies, the law enforcement agencies in those countries to develop those threats. 

Mr. COOK. Thank you. And I am jumping around a little bit, but 

I always go back to Turkey. And it is not even Thanksgiving. Anyway, bad joke. Really concerned about 

The PKK, the Erdogan, and it is like who is the terrorist and 

whether somebody is being falsely accused of being a terrorist. And 

obviously, this affects the politics of that particular country where 

you can use the counterterrorist threat to carry out a political 

agenda. Would you want to comment on that or is that too politically sensitive? Or is that something that would fall under counterterrorism? 

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Mr. SIBERELL. Well, I can say, sir, in general terms on a global 

basis we are quite concerned about how governments undertake 

their own counterterrorism efforts domestically. And those governments that might use counterterrorism as a justification for acts 

that transgressed human rights or that are heavy-handed, let’s say, 

in their security approach might actually drive the grievances that 

are leading to the terrorism in the first place. So that is a conversation we have globally with many, many partners around the 

world, and it is something that we watch very closely. 

Mr. POE. I thank the gentleman. 

The committee may ask you to appear before the committee in 

a classified setting. Colonel Cook and the ranking member and others have raised some questions that we may want to get to the bottom of it to understand the situation in the classified setting where 

some of these questions can be answered so we get to the bottom 

line of what is taking place. So thank you for being here today. You 

have got a lot of work to do. You have a got a mess on your hands 

as far as all these bad guys all over the world, you know, causing 

mischief and taking the lives of innocents. So it is a tough assignment. 

So, anyway, there may be some other questions that we have for 

you that we will put in writing and we will send to you, in addition 

to the possible classified setting. 

So without objection, all the witnesses’ prepared statements will 

be part of the record. Members will have 5 days to submit statements, questions, and extraneous materials for the record subject 

to the length limitation and the rules. 

And the subcommittee is adjourned. 

Mr. SIBERELL. Thank you. Thank you. 

[Whereupon, at 3:18 p.m., the subcommittee was adjourned.] 

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