♪ announcer: from our studios in new york city, this is "charlie rose." charlie: tensions continue to escalate this week between president trump and his counterparts in north korea and iran. in his first speech before the general assembly last week, president trump threatened to destroy north korea and called iran "a rogue nation." pres. trump: the united states has great strength and patience. but if it is forced to defend itself or its allies, we will have no choice but to totally destroy north korea. rocket man is on a suicide mission for himself and for his regime.

the iranian government masks a corrupt dictatorship behind the false guise of democracy. it has turned a wealthy country with a rich history and culture into an economically depleted rogue state whose chief exports are violence, bloodshed, and chaos. charlie: over the weekend, the president called kim jong-un a madman and wrongly accused iran of firing missiles. joining me now for the conversation about the most crucial national security issues of our time are nick burns, professor of diplomacy at harvard's kennedy school. and michael morrell, the host of a new cbs podcast. i'm pleased to have both of them here. welcome to the podcast. where are we in terms of both diplomacy and contingent planning?

michael: the fundamental problem is that the north koreans are a few months away, 6-12, from demonstrating the capability of putting a u.s. city at risk of nuclear attack. there are three pieces you have to have. one is nuclear weapons. the ability to get a nuclear yield out of an explosion at 100%. we know they have that. they have demonstrated it. they have tested it. got that guaranteed. the second is the ability to deliver a payload the distance you want it to go. they have done a couple of tests that demonstrated the capability to put a missile as far east as chicago or detroit. we don't know 100% what the weight of the payload they tested was, so we don't know exactly how far it could deliver a nuclear weapon. megan: --

charlie: sra chicago? as chicago orr detroit. we are not 100% how much the payload weighed. that is a big determinant of how far it can go. check for sure on the weapon. close to a check on the missile. third piece is, can you make a nuclear weapon small enough to fit on a missile? the intelligence community thinks they can do that. the last piece is, can you make it all work? can you make all of the electronics work under the intense vibrations of takeoff and reentry and the heat and pressure? that, we just don't know where they are. but the consensus view is they are getting very close to that. they are demonstrating that capability. the president has said they will not be allowed to achieve that capability. hence, the fundamental problem we have. diplomacy is, i think, nick is the diplomats here but i think

diplomacy is the right approach. i think putting pressure on them is the right approach. after 25 years of pressuring them, i am not 100% sure, in fact i am uncertain that will stop him from ultimately demonstrating that capability. charlie: does the language of the united nations -- does it make him realize america is serious and angry about this? or does it make them more certain in their desire to do something that will hurt the united states? nick: i think the language of the president over the last eight or nine days confuses them. what we need to do, based on mike's analysis is go back to , what we did so effectively in the cold war. strategic deterrence. he is a despicable leader. he is probably evil in many ways. but he is not a madman. we assume he is rational. what eisenhower would have done at the podium last week, or reagan, or bill clinton, would

have been to have said the following -- the united states is not going to be the aggressor. we will not attack north korea. but should they seek to attack, japan, south korea, or north , weican forces in asia will respond with overwhelming force. that is strategic deterrence. that is what secretary mattis is saying. it is with secretary tillerson is saying. it is what general dunford said this week in congressional testimony. it is what all of our experts are saying. but the president has come out with this shrill, bombastic language. charlie: destroy your nation. nick: it is too hot for the united nations. it loses its friends. it almost makes the despicable leader, kim jong-un to be the , victim. charlie: do you think you could force un security council resolutions? nick i think what the president : has been able to do with mattis and tillerson is move the chinese a little bit. we have got to practice strategic deterrence. we have to envelop in a bear hug the south koreans and japanese,

instead of saying, as the president did two weeks ago, i might cancel the free trade agreement with south korea. and third, sanctions. let me say something positive about the trump administration. in the last week, they have announced two sets of sanctions. sectoral and financial sanctions last week. this week, sanctions against individual companies, some of them chinese, trading with the north koreans. this is what president bush or president obama did so effectively with the iranians. they increased the leverage and the pain. they raised the cost to the iranians and drove them to the negotiating table. that sanctions piece is critical. and if the chinese central bank is serious and instructs the other banks in china to shut down lending to north korea, that is the kind of pressure, but it is diplomatic. it is sanctions. it is not making ourselves into the aggressor. i think that is a tactical mistake. charlie: suppose you were advising the president on the diplomatic front. if the north koreans came to the administration and said we will put a freeze exactly where we are now.

we are very, very close. we will freeze it if you eliminate all hostile actions against our country. would you take that deal? nick: i would not immediately. i would open negotiations on some variation. we probably cannot do right now is agree to a deal that says if the north koreans freeze their nuclear development in place, we will freeze all american military activities. because what you want to do in a negotiation is drive up the economic pressure of sanctions, but you also want to have the military preparedness and strength. we have an alliance obligation to south korea and japan to defend them. so some variation of that might be a final, messy compromise. but i don't think you agree to it at the beginning. michael: they will not make that offer. they want the same kind of strength going into negotiation. so what kim jong-un wants to do is demonstrate the capability of being able to attack a u.s. city, and then he will be happy

to sit down and talk to us and have a negotiation about where do we go from here in this relationship. charlie: he has more arrows in his quiver? michael: absolutely. charlie: do have a feeling about the notion there is anything short of a full-scale attack we can do militarily, in terms of cyber, in terms of being able to shut them down from a power standpoint? nick: i think just with iran in the last decade, we have to use all the instruments of american power to try to weaken him and coerce him to the negotiating table. but i agree with mike. you have to have a rigorous cost-benefit analysis of an american attack. choosing war with north korea. there are 30 million south koreans in the greater ultropolitan soul area -- seo area living below the dmz. 200,000 americans and 35,000 american troops. the most heavily mined place on earth. the north koreans have a tremendous conventional capacity with artillery. you would have to assume in first days or weeks of the war, maybe hundreds of thousands dead. that is not an exaggeration.

that is why you see serious people, general dunford, secretary mattis, going to the hill and speaking publicly , saying diplomacy is the way we go. so we get back to rhetoric, charlie. as the president gets out and keeps punching kim jong-un in this kind of eight-year-old taunting war going on, you listen to mattis in india this week. he has diplomacy eight or nine times in a paragraph. secretary tillerson. they are the calming influence. charlie: and to repeat we don't , want war with the north koreans. we will not attack north korea. nick: that is a very important signal to the north koreans. that was secretary tillerson. charlie: do they believe that? michael: the problem with the punching. there are two problems. one problem is he does fear, incorrectly, that the united states wants to get rid of him, his regime, and wants to reunite the north and south. on the south's terms. he sees these weapons as the ultimate deterrence against us doing that. so when the president uses the

kind of language he is using, it reinforces in kim the reason why he wants to have these weapons. the second is -- and this is a very strange thing about north korea -- they use the vitriol like no other country i know but for some reason our incredibly -- are incredibly sensitive to it. one thing you hear from the north koreans all the time is when south korea says something not nice about kim jong-un, the north koreans get their backup. this language not only reinforces their policy but it , is dangerous because it forces them into a corner. nick: i will also say on this count the problem with tough rhetoric that plays to the president's base is it introduces into the mind of kim jong-un and his advisors a doubt. are the americans in a defensive posture? they only attack us if we attack them? or could president trump be serious? if they think he is serious, that we might attack them first,

then you have the risk of a large-scale conflict. they put their troops on alert. we have american aircraft this week, bombers flying just outside the 12-mile airspace limit. i worry the rhetoric is destabilizing to strategic deterrence and deeply unwise. michael: the chinese did something very interesting three or four weeks ago during the height of the kim/trump rhetoric. the chinese said publicly two things. they said if the united states preemptively attacks north korea, we will fight on the side of north korea. and then they turned around and and said if north korea were to , attack first, north korea is on its own. that was a message of deterrence to both of us. it was the chinese being the adults in the room. very interesting. united states of america used to be the adult in the room. charlie: is there some back-channel communication going on right now between somebody

advising the north korean leader and who speaks to the president? nick: i don't know. i'm not in a position to know. charlie: would you expect that to be happening? nick: i would hope so. in a situation like this, if you do not have a diplomatic relationship with a government, and no one in the current government admits to meeting kim jong-un, you need to establish communication. i think secretary tillerson has been trying to do that. you saw, charlie, in the summer he was saying if there is a , pause in some of these nuclear and missile tests, maybe we can graduate to the next level. kim jong-un didn't give him a chance. there has been a flurry of tests of both varieties. i see secretary tillerson and secretary mattis as adults. i think they are trying to move us toward negotiations. they understand this is a long-term struggle with north korea. it is not going to be resolved this year or next. we do need to get to the negotiating table probably for a compromise which will be deeply unsatisfying to people who want to just end this crisis. but if you can avoid a war and

play for time freeze the north , koreans in place, that is not a bad outcome if you can get it. michael: here is one of the things you have to worry about in a war scenario. when i described the three pieces they need to put a u.s. city at risk, i said we know a lot about one. we know mostly about the other. and that's one in the middle we , don't know a lot about. at the end of the day, we don't really know what their capabilities are today. if kim jong-un fired an icbm with a nuclear weapon on it today, it might work. the former dni, jim klapper, what he is saying publicly is we have to assume, prudence requires that in military planning and diplomatic here, we have to assume he might be able to attack us successfully today with a nuclear weapon. so going to war today not only risks definite war with south korea, between north korea and south korea, but maybe a nuclear strike on korea, maybe on japan,

and maybe a nuclear strike on the united states of america. that is how serious this is. charlie: let me turn to iran. they also suffered some rhetorical assault from the president. he said not only was the deal an embarrassment but he called iran regime," and "a rogue nation." why is he doing that? why was that necessary? what was the point? michael: let me tee up the problem and let my diplomatic friend solve it for us here. charlie: i will sit back and listen. michael: there are two buckets. one is the iranian nuclear weapons program. the second is iranian misbehavior in the region. their own conducting terrorism, their support to terrorists, their support to insurgents, desire for regional influence, their desire that israel be wiped off the face of the

planet. that whole set of issues. right? this first issue, i believe the jcpoa, the nuclear deal has put that issue in a box for the next 10-15 years. it is not perfect, but it is pretty darn good because it has put them in a box for 10 to 15 years. and as far as i know, the iranians are living up to almost the entirety of the agreement. there are just a handful of small issues where they are not in compliance. but those are minor issues. the president had to make a decision about how to handle the first one, and he also needs to make a decision on how to handle the second one. how do we disincentivize, deter, the iranians from this misbehavior in the region? that is the second thing he has to decide to do, and that has to be done against the following backdrop which is the most , interesting internal politics inside iran in a long time. there is a real struggle

internally that is playing out publicly between the hardliners and what i call the centrists, many people would call them moderates. i call them the centrists. charlie: rouhani. michael: he is a centrist. the supreme leader is a hardliner, and it is a fight, a struggle over whether iran will remain a revolutionary nation or going to be a normal nation. it was fought publicly -- charlie: i asked the prime that veryf iran question kissinger just posted, if you want to be a nation or a movement? he said we want to be both. michael: you can't be both. both cannot exist, coexist at the same time. this debate played out publicly on the debate stage between rouhani and his very conservative candidate for president. the iranian people voted and spoke overwhelmingly they wanted to go in a certain direction. so the question is in trying to , manage the nuclear issue, the president has to make a decision on it soon and managing

, the regional misbehavior, how do you do that in a way that does not strengthen the hardliners and weaken the centrists? nick is going to tell us -- charlie: before you do that. i just want to make sure that everybody at home -- when you talk about supporting terrorism, the charges against iran is they they are heavily supporting heavily involved against the , saudi's with both having cloud organizations in yemen. that is go ahead. one. nick: iran itself conducts terrorism around the world against israeli and jewish targets and against the targets of its neighbors. charlie: how does it do that? nick: it has an apparatus -- charlie: what is it doing? it is one thing to say -- i am asking because -- assassinating -- nick: the saudi ambassador in the united states several years ago. the bombing -- charlie: that was not carried out. it was interrupted. nick: it was interrupted. there was an attack in europe several years ago. the iranians were involved in

that. so they are the only -- i think it is fair to say they are the only state in the world is still practices terrorism as a tool of statecraft. that is one. they provide support to two, terrorist groups, hezbollah, hamas, and others. hezbollah could not exist without the support it gets from iran. that is support to insurgents in two. the region trying to overthrow regimes in yemen, bahrain, eastern provinces of saudi arabia. their support for people like president assad is another issue. that is what i mean by regional misbehavior. nick: to use mike's construct of these two big problems, i think president trump is right to try to push the iranians back on the big struggle for power in the middle east. and he is wrong, president trump, to try to wiggle out of the iran nuclear deal. why? there is a big shia/sunni struggle for power. yemen encapsulates -- charlie: we have taken sides and

said we support the saudis who represent the sunnis. nick: and president trump was right to do that. charlie: why was he right? i thought president obama's tactic was a bit different. not saying we are coming full-scale behind the saudis. i thought president obama's tactic was to try to recognize iran has a legitimate interest in the region and try to get the saudis to talk to them. because the foreign minister said here at this table we , cannot get them to talk to us. nick: it is hard to talk. charlie: isn't that what the president wanted to do, obama, he wanted the saudis to talk to the iranians? nick: it is hard to do that when the iranians are launching military offenses through the hutu rebels in yemen trying to establish a contiguous line from lebanon.o damascus to it is as if the great shia power , iran is punching a big hole in , the sunni world, challenging the power of the sunni state. this is an existential issue for

the gulf region, egypt, and for israel. as we all know, israeli relations with these countries are the best ever because they have a common enemy. so i think president trump has been right. frankly despite my deep respect , for president obama and support for him, i did not think he was as effective on this. we have to be sending military aid and acting politically to isolate the iranians. charlie: we made a big deal with the saudis to sell them military equipment. nick: we did. i think we were right to do that. we were right to do that. on the other hand, as you know, i was the point person on iran for the george w. bush administration, 2005-2008, we spent our time sanctioning the iranians. we never got to the negotiating table. i think it would be a great mistake for president trump to walk away from the nuclear deal. charlie: why shouldn't we be trying to have a better relationship with iran so you can yes push back wherever they , are being adventurous, "behavior"ere is

that does not follow what you hope would come out of the nuclear deal? we thought the nuclear deal with -- would lead to some betterment of relations because you could build on that. that has not happened. they have been more aggressive. people on the right will argue that as soon as they release the sanctions, the money coming into iran because the sanctions were released would immediately turn in part to support their misbehavior. nick: i supported the nuclear deal, president obama's deal, because i thought if we could freeze them for 10 to 15 years, good for us. strategic, tactical advantage for us. they get sanctions relief. we put restrictions on them. if we walk away from the deal, they get sanctions relief and all the restrictions are off so we lose big time. charlie: you can't rebuild the sanctions. nick: there are people more idealistic about the iranians who argued in 2015 for the deal saying it will change the , behavior in middle east. we have seen nothing like that. charlie: i don't know if they said that. nick: some of them said that. we have seen nothing like that. and they are a threat to israel

and the arab partners we have had for generations. charlie: so how else should we treat iran? should we view them as a hostile power to american interests? therefore, anybody against iran is our friend? michael: i agree with nick 100%. on the nuclear issue, they are in compliance. stepping away from it would be a strategic mistake. it would split us from our allies. it would play to the hardliners. it would send them back to working on the nuclear program. it would create in a few months a nuclear crisis. we already have one with north korea. let's not start another one with iran. so leave that alone. second, i agree we need to find places in the middle east where we can push back on what the iranians are doing to raise the cost to them to deter them. , charlie: what is an example of

that where we can find a place , to push back to deter the iranians? what would be the policy that would do that? the implementation of what policy? michael: we are doing that right now, as we sit here and speak. there are u.s. special forces on the ground in yemen that were put there by the trump administration to support the saudi's are doing there, which is supporting our allies and pushing back on what the iranians are trying to achieve in yemen. that is a perfect example. we should be willing to do things like that to raise the cost. we should, in order to not disrupt the political debate in iran, do as much of this with our allies as we can. when we do it by ourselves, we become something the hardliners -- charlie: your argument is we need to band with the people who want to isolate iran. michael: we banded together and isolated them on the nuclear issue. let's band together and isolate them on the regional issues. charlie: so they hurt, and

therefore if they heard, they may change the behavior. hurt, and may change the behavior. michael: right. nick: the other place is syria. we have american special forces on the ground. it is a fluid situation where the eastern half of the country is up for grabs. we want to deny iran basic control of the syrian space with the syrian government, given what that future would portend for the syrian people. charlie: where does syria stand today? "the new york times" had a piece , a big piece on the front page in the past week. "assad in full control." nick: assad has survived. he is in control. he is stronger than he has been in many years, in a 6.5 years since the civil war began. on a line from damascus all the aleppo there is control. , idlib province is under siege right now. the eastern part of the country is up for grabs. charlie: with the russians on facebook buying ads and a range of other things, it is clear it was a policy of the russian government to disrupt the

american democratic process. boys and girls this is apart , from what happened with hacking. michael: i think we've learned two important things in the last 72 hours. one is that the russian propaganda in the united states went well beyond just the elections. they were playing deeper in u.s. society. they were playing in the black lives matter issue, for example trying to divide americans on , race. that is one thing we learned. the second thing we learned is they are still doing it today. today. so within a few hours of president trump and the nfl scrumming with each other, the russians were playing on that issue, trying to divide america

on that issue. they have not stopped. they are still doing it today. charlie: how are they doing it? michael: they have fake accounts. they are starting to be uncovered. they have fake accounts. they also use bots, robots, that have the robots sending computers sending out these messages, these tweets, these facebook posts to social media that gets their message across. nick: nine months into his presidency, our president has not defended the country against these actions mike just described. any other president would have formed a bipartisan committee to investigate and raise our defenses. it does get to the credibility of 2018 and 2020 elections. it goes beyond it. charlie: it is urgent. nick: it is urgent. the fact that the president this week denies there is a problem means congress needs to exercise

its constitutional responsibility and take this matter into its own hands, as they did with the russia sanctions. charlie: former secretary of state hillary clinton on this , program on monday night was rigorous in calling for a bipartisan investigating committee to get to the bottom of this. nick: she is right. it has to happen. i think, charlie, you are seeing the executive and legislative have been tussling since 1789 over who has power in foreign affairs. congress has to take it if the president is not going to exercise it. charlie: thank you both. >> you are welcome. we will be right back. stay with us. ♪

♪ >> president trump was in new york for the open up the general assembly. axis ofed on a new evil, venezuela, iran, and north korea. he followed any third executive order strengthened a sanctioned aimed at halting north korea's nuclear program version joining me with the reaction is leased a set, she is a bbc chief international correspondent. i must say to her as she will knows outside of my own cbs news, she's my favorite international correspondent. >> it's great to be on your

program. it's the program everybody wants to be on. >> talk about the role for you at the bbc. as the chief international correspondent. are you on one play after another? from one hotspot to another? i always say it's an optical illusion that people see you and they hear every day that i'm in flights, and on tv. sometimes for long periods of time i'm off. coveringt the bbc is the main stories of the day. in the last six years it has often taken me to places like syria or iraq, the gaza strip. it's a measure of our time many , of the main stories of the day are not historical, but often frontline coverage in these terrible and terrifying wars of our time., of the main e with enormous

devastation to the country, to its people, the people that have him killed, the people that are refugees. every seen anything like that and in all of your international coverage? it isn't because we are we now witnessing the most documented were ever, -- vietnam was the first televised war. improper combat and casualties into the living rooms of america. everyone can watch the streaming on youtube. everything that happens in syria. and yet it seems to be a war of our time that all of the institutions and powers are unable or unwilling to end this war. it stopped being about syria a long time ago. there are so many powers with so many interests. >> these are countries with proxies. >> these are proxies. turkey is worried about the kurds, saudi arabia is worried about iran, america has played a

certain role, not the kind that it's arab allies would want, a ron is there defending its interests -- iran is there defending its interests, russia is there. everyone has something they want from syria. unfortunately if you drill down it's not about the welfare of syrians and i said from the , beginning that the fate of one man, president assad, has mattered more than 22 million people -- whether it's those saying he must stay or go here we are , approaching the seventh year of what started as a peaceful uprising. president assad is still in power, and the opposition has lost any territorial foothold that could challenge president assad. charlie: they have to have credibility with the syrian people. guest: more than half of syria's prewar population is either displaced inside syria, dead, or

a refugee abroad. that is syria today. many fear that it has been an existential crisis to syria, that syria as they knew it no longer exists. you sit with syrians and you can see they don't want to say it. they want to believe that something called syria still exists. but when we are looking at now is jordan have an influence in the south, turks have influence in the north, the russians and a rainy and -- russians and iranians having influence where president assad prevailed. there are definitely tensions pulling it apart. but there are people trying to pull it back together. i think there are many narratives about syrians not black and white. there's a kaleidoscope of interests. a kaleidoscope is correct because a kaleidoscope is constantly changing. you have people who shift their know turkey do

deals with russia at the end of last year, which ended in negotiated solution. i know you did quite a lot of reporting on that. look at the region. is it in anyone's interest that we have another country which totally collapses? i think the last few years, even saudi arabia would say we do not want the state to collapse in syria. it is not in our interests for president assad to precipitously go with them. they want to transition. i think what people would say, even though the west has now -- you know very well that foreign policy for countries has to be first about their domestic interests, so president obama and president trump have decided that the national interest is in the fight against the so-called islamic state. you can i can -- you and i can

discuss responsibility the hard , reality is that they are willing to put their aircraft into the sky to fight against the so-called islamic state, regarded as a threat to the world. they've accepted that president assad isn't about to go. he is not going to go voluntarily and is not going to be toppled military. right now the negotiators are not really going anywhere. even those who accept that say that if there is to be a future for syria, there has to be a change of leadership. that has to come from within syria itself. following the negotiations for the past few years, the syrian delegation has never indicated they are ready to go for a political transition. the words they use in damascus is "a government of national unity pickup -- unity." in other words, we are not giving you defense, interior, finance. if you didn't defeat us on the

battlefield, why can you defeat us on the negotiating table? i think what the u.n. envoy, what world powers, and i think even russia understands -- because russia and iran and china are the ones who are going to get the big contracts cut -- they don't want to go into nationbuilding. they have neither the money or the interest. the eu foreign policy chief is saying we've got some money, but if you want this money, you have to engage in a political transition. president assad and his supporters by? that's where the syrian crisis is now. charlie: there's another crisis between saudi arabia and iran. it is seen in yemen, it is seen in syria to a degree. where does this battle between shia and sunni, between iran and its allies, and between saudi

arabia and its allies mark -- allies? guest: it comes down to a battle of power between the main sunni and shia powers. charlie: when he was elected, president trump went to riyadh. and that side was reflected in his u.n. speech when he lashed out against iran. guest: right. to use his words, "the murderous regime of iran." i think most people would say it is not essentially a doctrinal fight, a religious fight. it is a political fight between saudi arabia and iran. saudi arabia does feel threatened, they still see it.

iran, even under sanctions, they became a power in iraq, and yemen. i think when you get down to it, it is about power. it is about access to the government, access to money, access to positions, access to determining the future course of a country. the saudis are trying to get more involved in iraq because access to positions, access to they want to challenge iran on its spheres of influence. i think that is where you see this, because it is interesting. when you speak to senior saudis, they say the battle in syria is less about president assad. it is about iran. that is the biggest fault line,

one of the biggest fault lines, possibly the biggest, now fracturing the middle east, versus the smaller one between qatar, saudi arabia, and the emirates. one of the biggest fault lines, charlie: why don't the saudis at some point say, enough is enough, they are supporting people that are opposed to us and they are supporting terrorism? that's what they said about qatar. they said, we've got these 13 demands. turns out most of them boil down to not so much al jazeera and all those other things, but boiled down to some sense of please stop supporting revolutions against us and our allies. yes or no? what is at the heart of this? guest: again, i think it comes down to power. in their eyes, qatar, from its inception, has been a maverick rogue nation.

they punch above their weight. you listen to the qatari, they say we should be able to forge our own independent policy. we have big ambitions and we are very wealthy. let's be honest, they hosted the taliban of afghanistan. that wasn't really a maverick move. the united states wanted them to do that. they also gave refuge to hamas. the united states was also very aware of that. they also given refuge to radical clerics who go on al jazeera and condemn the monarchs in the gulf, condemn the saudis, so the saudis see it as a direct threat. in this battle there are rights and wrongs of both sides. charlie: how will it in? -- get end? -- how will it end? guest: it will take a long time. president has said, oh, this is easy. this is something i can do.

the west and the europeans tend to think that it is a squabble. can you just get along? your political unity is being affected, your financial unity is being affected. they say it is much deeper. they feel threatened by qatar, but it is equally true -- take the one phrase president trump used time and time again in his speech and some ways hypocritically, "sovereignty." qatar sees themselves as a sovereign nation. the saudi's don't like it, the iraqis don't like it. they see it as a threat. got the emir of qatar and the province of saudi

arabia to talk to each other, apparently the call didn't go that badly. it just set off sparks again because they then presented it as being different. charlie: thank you for coming. great to have you here. chief international correspondent for the bbc. back in a moment. stay with us. ♪ ♪

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charlie: alfred hitchcock's film "psycho" was hailed as a classic upon its release in 1960. it shocked audiences across the world. roger ebert wrote in 1998 that it remains the most effective slashing in history, suggesting that the artistry are more important than graphic details. alexander philippe's new documentary "7852" offers a new look. here's a look at the trailer. >> it was intended to cause people to scream and yell. i was horrified to find that some people took it seriously. >> it was actually the first time in the history of movies where it wasn't safe to be in the movie theater. >> when a moment of violence is

so suggestive, so unlike anything you have seen. >> murder was now going to be an acceptable part of entertainment. >> "psycho" you thought could happen to you. this is the first movie that showed you could be naked alone in the shower, and someone is going to come in and just stab you. >> it had to be done impression is to play. the head, the feet, the hands. >> he has broken the covenant for filmmaker an audience, and the audience cannot wait to see more. ♪ charlie: i am pleased to have alexander philippe at this table. what is it for you? was it hitchcock? was it an obsession with this scene?

guest: i think it was very much and his work. 5-6--- yearsing old, his movies were around. in hitchcockrst movies and colombo. i think it was very much an obsession with hitchcock and his work. growing up and watching his movies over and over again in switzerland, there was a point where i started wondering, why do i keep going back to these movies? obviously they are extremely entertaining, but there is also something he is doing. becoming a film maker, i think mr. hitchcock has become an endless source of inspiration for me. charlie: why is it that this "psycho" has this kind of impact on audiences? guest: there's so many reasons that "psycho" broke a number of taboos and changed profoundly cinema, but also the way that we watch movies. back in the day, people were walking in out of a theater with

this idea that you have to line up to wait for a movie to begin was brand-new. it was part of the marketing of movies. he did that because he didn't want people to walk in on the middle of the shower scene. i think when you look at the shower scene -- it is frankly the ultimate cinematic trick. this is something hitchcock had been working towards his entire life. he saw an opportunity when he read the book to have this sort of epic murder in the bathtub. it is so fascinating to me that he took seven days to shoot this one scene, something that had never been done before and probably has not been done since. charlie: this is what your movie is about. guest: the movie really focuses on very narrowly the shower scene. i am a big believer in looking

at details as a way for me to investigate hitchcock and his craft, and to talk about cinema. the scene -- i've been working now three years full-time on it -- and i feel like i am just scratching the surface, getting to the point where i am starting to understand it. i could be working on that scene for the rest of my life and never get to the bottom of it. charlie: this is janet lei gh's body double recalling her audition with hitchcock. here it is. >> i was 21 years old, a pinup model. i was working with the photographer, and he said that universal was looking for somebody to pose in a film, so i called and made an appointment. i went and spoke with mr.

hitchcock, and basically had to strip down, got dressed again, and then was interviewed by janet leigh. i had to strip down for her, too. my body was very similar to hers, so i got hired. i had to report for makeup one or two days later, and there is the red light flashing, no admittance, all of this, and i thought here they are expecting a stripper. i was not quite completely nude. i had what was called a crotch patch. during filming with the shower going and everything, it would come loose. i told hitchcock, why don't we take this thing off? he said no. the whole time he wore a suit, black tie and white shirt. i was hired for two or three days and wound up working for seven.

charlie: what did you learn about hitchcock? guest: oh my goodness, i don't even know where to begin. for me it was really sort of an investigation into his process. for instance, he sort of gives you little clues along the way. the trailer we just watched a little bit of, the six minute extended trailer he did for "psycho" reviews walking around -- where he's walking around the property show you things, actually giving you clues. there is one point where he approaches the painting of susanna and the elders in norman bates' office, the painting he removed to peep through the wall and watch marion. he says, "this painting has great significance because --" and then he pauses and goes on. he wants you to figure out why he is using this painting.

i went to great lengths to find out why this particular paintin that -- this particular painting, and there are hundreds of versions of susanna and the elders, why did he use this one. hitchcock was so precise -- why it was this one. hitchcock was so precise in his filming that everything had meaning. same with the investigation we did with the sound of the knife striking the flesh. he used a very specific type of melon called a cassava. there are hundreds of varieties of melon, and some of these there are special orders and you can't just order one. i think we had about 220 melon's onset, and we stabbed the mall -- we stabbed them all and recorded each melon specifically to try and find why he picked because of a -- why he picked the cassava versus any

other. i won't give it away. charlie: how did this influence phil making forever after? -- influence filmmaking forever after? guest: in terms of technique, a -- it created a brand-new language. film,ter murch says in my people were not used to watching movies in this particular way, the sort of fast editing, different point of views. the scene is edited in a way where you are both marion and also the killer. it is really something that people in 1960 were not used to seeing, and sure enough the reaction was extremely powerful. i just lost my train of thought. charlie: how did this influence sentiment? -- cinema? guest: you are looking at a

scene that i think is quite problematic because it is, quite frankly, the first true slasher seen where you have -- slasher scene where you have a woman vulnerable and alone in the shower being brutally killed with a knife. i think it opened a possibility of violence in cinema that we quite frankly have not recovered from. here we are 57 years later, and i think we are still talking about the shower scene. it is still something that fascinates and horrifies. charlie: did hitchcock talk about a? what -- about it? was he interviewed about it? did he uncover all the secrets? guest: no. when he was asked about the shower scene, he said "i'm really quite surprised about the reaction. 'psycho'was a big joke."

but this is its copying hitchcock. ieee -- 'psycho' was a big joke." but this is hitchcock being hitchcock. i believe he truly cared about that film. he does it again in "the birds." -- this idea that horrible things can happen to good people at any time for no good reason. it's really upsetting thing. i look at "psycho" and "the birds" as companion pieces. nobody knows why the birds attack. it is never explained, but they do. charlie: good to have you here. "78/52" opens in select theaters and will be available on vod on october 18th. -- october 13. thank you for joining us, see you next time.

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♪ tom: from new york city, i'm tom keene in for jonathan ferro. with 30 minutes dedicated to the fixed income markets, this is "bloomberg real yield." ♪ tom: coming up, will it be low rate kevin as the president meets the former fed governor? in this hour, will chairman wars keep the real yield lower for longer? yellen speaks, the nominal yield spikes higher, a little transitory september gives way to an inflated october